


We Rewrite Our Histories

by MessengerHermes



Category: X-Men Evolution
Genre: (Seriously fuck how Freddy is treated), All mutants are bisexual, Angst and Humor, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Awkward Conversations, Awkward Flirting, Callisto adopts the brotherhood, Canon Fatphobia, Canon Rewrite, Charles Xavier is an Asshole, Drabble Collection, Fluff and Angst, Forge and Todd are Science Bros, Fuck Canon, Home Improvement, Kodd, Kurt is made of fuzz and spite, Let Toad be a rebel nerd 2k21, Let the Brotherhood have friends, Magneto is an asshole, Multi, Mystique's terrible child-rearing skills, Nightcrawler/Toad Event 2021, Not Beta Read, Not Canon Compliant, Polyamory, The Brotherhood gets therapy, Where are your parents children, cw: weed, disaster teenagers, naps
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-18
Updated: 2021-03-26
Packaged: 2021-03-26 21:08:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 16
Words: 47,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30112071
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MessengerHermes/pseuds/MessengerHermes
Summary: What if some of the X-Kids decided the Brotherhood weren't enemies or a problem to be dealt with, but potential friends they could nag into doing shit like, brushing their teeth and believing in themselves? What if Kurt discovered who his mother was, saw the shit job Mystique was doing leading the brotherhood and said to themself "Fuck it, I'll do it myself?This is a series of moments that plays havoc with the X-Men Evolution series' original timeline, with the stories beginning roughly in the second half of the kids' junior year of high school, and spanning into their late teens early 20s. The stories fill in the big gaps left by the series and take paths I wish had happened, like Freddy apologizing to Jean, like Kurt getting a circus family, like Todd and Forge having a secret lab together.Some chapters are in response to the Kodd 2021 revival challenge, but many are me running in my own direction.
Relationships: Amara Aquilla/Tabitha Smith, Evan Daniels/Kurt Wagner (Mentioned), Evan Daniels/Pietro Maximoff (Past), Kitty Pryde/Lance Alvers (referenced), Tabitha Smith/Kurt Wagner, Toad/Kurt Wagner, Toad/Tabitha Smith, Wanda Maximoff/Toad
Comments: 67
Kudos: 19





	1. Person to Person: Jean & Freddy

**Author's Note:**

> A thing that always frustrated me with Evolution was how shittily the Brotherhood is treated and how the show doesn't give any nuance in their characterizations. They're a bunch of children with implied abuse in their pasts, who are largely unsupervised and unsupported. 
> 
> This chapter offers a fix-it moment around how Freddy was introduced to the show and his first interaction with Jean. This is an idea I've had forever and finally got around to writing thanks to a Kodd Discord Server Prompt. 
> 
> I hope to keep up with the 2021 prompts, but even if I don't get to many, I hope y'all enjoy what I do share.

Freddy’s spent the last hour of this surreal, sweaty trek through the woods with the X-mansion kids trying to find a way to start the conversation when Jean Grey stops so swiftly Lance’s girlfriend almost walks through her. 

“Freddy, would you like to talk for a minute?” She asks, turning towards him in a way a tiny part of him finds incredibly eerie. 

Todd and Pietro shoot each other bewildered glances before turning to Freddy. Todd mouths “the fuck” at him from his perch in a nearby tree, still crouched ready for his next jump. Pietro is doing his blurry “I’m worried, but trying to act like I don’t care” side to side jitterbug thing at the front of the group. 

By contrast, the X-Kids look more curious than freaked out. Nightcrawler, who’d been leading the way through the woods, looks between Freddy and Jean as if trying to puzzle something out. At least that’s what Freddy thinks his expression is, with the blue mutant’s hologram thing off, his face looks more like two candle lights shining in a dark window than anything. He’d been the one to suggest the rivals team up, at least until they reached the mountain top, upon discovering Mystique had dumped the brotherhood in the woods with no equipment or food. Weirdly, Freddy thought he’d overheard the furry mutant muttering something about “you’d think she made a hobby of abandoning children” at some point, but he didn’t question it. 

The other two, Pietro’s ex boyfriend he wouldn’t admit was his ex boyfriend, and Shadowcat are doing a terrible job at whispering to each other about what is happening. 

Freddy looks at Jean, who smiles, just a tiny bit when she catches his eye, before glancing at the Brotherhood members and nodding just slightly. He hopes they get the idea. 

“Yeah, uh, if you don’t mind, that is.” He says, taking a step closer to her. 

Freddy doesn’t miss the way Spyke and Shadowcat both tense, and tries to ignore the tightness in his chest in response. He earned that reaction after all. Again, it’s Nightcrawler who ends up being the diffuser, putting a hand on Spyke’s shoulder and drawing the other two X-kids attention. 

“I think I hear a creek close by.” He says, “We all can wait for you two there.” He nods at Jean, and Freddy starts when he does the same to him, before turning and slipping away into the trees. 

Shadowcat and Spyke stare after the blue mutant, before turning back to look at Jean, their shoulders tight. Jean turns that same smile on them she just gave Freddy. 

“Go on, we won’t take long.” She says.

The pair glance at each other before relaxing, they nod to Jean and spare Freddy a quick glance before following Nightcrawler. Todd and Pietro look at Freddy, both still hovering in the same spots they’d been in since Jean stopped them all. Freddy tries for a reassuring smile, from Todd’s raised eyebrow and Pietro’s squint, he misses the mark. 

“Go head. I just wanna say something to her.” He says. 

Pietro stops his vibrating and sighs, throwing his head back as if Freddy just asked him to run cross country and back. “Fine. But more than 5 minutes suffering with those three dweebs and I’m out.” 

Todd gives him a considering look, before hopping down from his tree. “Okay, but don’t get your brain scrambled. Scream if you need help.” 

Jean snorts next to him, and Freddy hopes that means brain scrambling isn’t a concern. Just grunts and jerks his head in the direction the X-kids went. The other two Brotherhood members grumble, but make their exit. Leaving the two mutants alone. 

Freddy’s thoughts start back into the loop they’d begun an hour back into these seemingly endless woods. His palms sweat and he shakily wipes them on his coveralls, trying to find a place to start. 

Jean reaches out, placing a hand on his arm, “Freddy, I know. You, uh, you think kinda loudly. It’s okay.” 

Freddy jerks back, “No! It’s not okay! Yeah, you know ‘cause you can hear thoughts or whatever, but that isn’t the same thing as me saying it.” 

His chest feels tight and his face is on fire and he feels that familiar out of controlness start to creep up on him, like he’s a river churning too fast. He doesn’t want this again. He wants to be different. 

“Freddy--” Jean starts, and he raises a hand, stooping to sit on a mossy rock. 

“Just--hang on.” He says, sucking in a breath. Then another.

He leans down and runs his hands over his scalp, feeling the fuzz where his sides are starting to grow out. Idly he remembers their clippers are broken, Todd’ll probably have to pinch a new one soon.

His chest loosens, and the air no longer feels so hot around him. At the edge of his vision he can see Grey’s hiking boots scuffing the leaf litter around her.

“Thank you.” He says. Jean this time, doesn’t try to surge forward with what she already knows, and he sighs, relieved, and ploughs forward. “I never thanked you before. For yelling at them guys. People say shit like that all the time. I was trash, back home. I mean that’s how people talked about me. And if people helped, it was kids who got just as much shit, and folks doubled down on them, so they quit.” 

He drops his hands to his knees, running his palms over the worn denim, keeping his eyes on the ground, “But you’re pretty, and smart, and people like you. You’re the last person I’d expect to stick your nose out for the new fat kid.” 

He hears Jean go still, and suck in a breath like she’s about to speak. He raises his head to look at her and she stops. 

“I’m not saying you’re better than them, or better than the other bullied kids who helped me, because you got the looks people like and they didn’t. I’m just naming it’s a thing, and also you did something cool for me when you didn’t have to and I appreciate it.” He says. 

Jean’s hands are fiddling with the pockets of her vest, snapping and unsnapping the buttons. It’s such a nongrownup thing to do, it kinda makes Freddy like her more. It makes her feel human instead of like a magazine model in real life. Which reminds him of the second part of his thought loop. 

“And I’m sorry. I didn’t treat you like a person.” He says, letting the words fall between them like the rock they feel like. “You’re pretty. And a girl. And I knew those boys wanted you, but you didn’t care, and it made me want you.” He realizes how that sounds and feels his face heat up, his stomach twisting, “Not like, that or anything. I mean, I wanted your attention more I guess. But instead of trying to talk to you, or be your friend. I did the same shit they did, and tried to keep you like a toy, not a person. And then I went and fought Rogue like an ass, and I’m pretty sure you all think I’m a real donkey and I can’t blame you. But I realized, I don’t want to do that to someone again. Because I don’t like being treated like I’m trash, and I don’t think being treated like a toy is any better.” 

Freddy, sighs, dusting invisible dirt off his coveralls before standing up. He takes a step back as he does. Jean hardly comes up to his chest and he doesn’t want to crowd her. He also hates getting a crick in his neck looking at short folks. He will never tell the other boy, but he actually appreciates Todd crouching on his shoulder for that reason, saves him a pain from craning his neck. 

“I’m a person and you saw that, thank you. You’re a person, but I didn’t see that, I’m sorry.” He says looking Jean in the eye. 

Jean looks at him and smiles, before ducking her head. She blows out a huge breath, ending in a raspberry and Freddy has to bite his lip to keep from laughing. She whips her head back up and shoves a hand towards him. Freddy windmills backward, panicked before realizing she’s not trying to hit him. Her hand is held out for him to shake. 

“I’m Jean. I’m on cheer team because it looks good for college applications and I wanna be a doctor. I hate flossing, and actually love magenta even though it makes me look like a bad valentine’s card with my hair. Hi.” She says, all in a rush. 

This time Freddy does laugh, grasping her hand in his. Her shake is really strong, despite how her long fingers disappear in his broad palm. 

“I’m Freddy. I’m on nothing because sports bore me. I love cooking and can make magic out of all the half eaten shit folks forget in the fridge. I dunno what I wanna be, but I’m good with kids and animals. I hate bacon but don’t tell anybody, I’ll lose credit as a Texan.” He says. 

Jean laughs and they part, both turning in the direction the other kids went. 

“I don’t expect you to forget what I did, or even forgive me just ‘cause I’m sorry.” Freddy says. 

Jean smiles, “Well good. Because I won’t, but I do, so long as you stay true to what you just said, about remembering people are people, not things.” 

She leans to bump into his shoulder, but really ends up kinda bouncing off his arm and they both laugh.

“Sounds like a good deal.” He says, as they break into a small clearing by the river Nightcrawler must have heard.

The others are all there. Sans Pietro, who abruptly zips into the clearing, stopping not 6 inches from Freddy as Todd shouts “They’re back!” into the woods.

“What-day-is-it?-Who’s-the-President?When’s-my-birthday?” He asks in rapid fire.

Freddy snorts, and glances apologetically at Jean. She smirks, pats his arm and keeps walking, stopping to sit beside Shadowcat on a nearby log. Freddy notes that while Todd is lounging on some nearby moss, Nightcrawler and Spyke are shirtless in the river. Spyke has made himself a long bone spike spear, and is periodically stabbing it into the water with a shout. 

After a particularly loud, splashy display on Spyke’s account, Nightcrawler, whips around, tail slapping the water and shouting, his accent thick, “Would you stop that? Scaring the fish is literally the opposite of catching them!”

Distracted by what has to be the worst attempt at noodling he’s ever seen, Freddy apparently took too long to answer Pietro’s near gibberish Brain Scrambling Check questions, since the speedy mutant has begun his anxiety jitterbug again. He pokes Freddy in the chest chanting, “Hey-Hey-Hey” sounding like that video game Lance likes. Freddy snatches at his hand. He misses but at least Pietro stops poking. 

“It’s Mystique dumped us in the woods to play king of the mountain when we coulda slept in day. The president is the guy who choked on a pretzel, and you keep making up birthdays in hopes that we’ll give you extra presents, so I don’t actually know which one’s real.” He says. 

Pietro visibly relaxes, whipping around to shout at Todd, “His brain works! As good as it ever does anyway.” 

Todd lifts his arm from his face to look over at them. “Fantastic. Glad all cylinders’re firing there, Dukes.” He turns to look over at Jean, “In that case, you mind force choking a couple’a fish for us, Red, and putting these two jackasses out of our misery? I’d like to eat lunch in this century.” 

“Those two have been playing mountain man for the whole time you and Red riding hood over there had your little heart to heart.” Todd says as Freddy comes to sit down beside them. 

This starts another round of bickering between Nightcrawler and Spyke about proper fishing techniques. Freddy catches something about “Which of us actually grew up in the woods, huh” over Jean and Shadowcat’s laughter. The telekinetic obliges, raising one hand. Several fish rise squirming from the water. Freddy hesitates a minute, remembering what his aunt taught him about spawning and which to pick. 

Nightcrawler seems to have the same idea, because he plucks several fish out of the air, wrapping their wriggling forms in one of his discarded shirts, before nodding his head toward the river. Jean seems to understand, because she gently drops the remaining floating fish back in. 

Before another round of squabbling can break out, Freddy waves a hand at the blue mutant. 

“I can help you gut those,” he says, and Nightcrawler tilts his head, sizing him up. 

Freddy braces, feeling that defensiveness from earlier creep back up, but then the blue mutant heaves a dramatic sigh, turning an accusing eye to Spyke. 

“I will take you up on that, and hope your fish gutting skills are more bona fied than some people’s so called fishing abilities.” He says, verbally jabbing at the blond mutant. 

Spyke waves his bone spear at Nightcrawler, “Hey I didn’t see you do any better.” 

Jean cuts them off before more squabbling breaks out and what fish they do have go tumbling back into the water. 

“I think we can trust Freddy’s fish credentials.” She says, smiling at him.

He smiles back, “Thanks, Jean.”


	2. A Secret Lab on Campus: Todd & Forge

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, I can't answer a prompt straight to save my life. 
> 
> Instead of a secret cabin Kurt has in the woods, here's a secret lab Forge has on the edge of the school grounds, which he invites Todd to. In the comics, Toad often is some kind of engineer/rocket scientist, and I really wish Evolution brought that in with the episode introducing Forge's pocket dimension machine. So, you know, I made that happen. 
> 
> Content warnings for pot-smoking as well as mention a racist teacher, that bit is non-detailed, but still happens.

“So, my dude, you’re wicked smart.” Forge says, dropping seemingly out of the void to disturb Todd’s illicit smoke break beside the gym dumpster. 

Todd swallows a screech, fingers fumbling his cigarette. 

“Dawg, what? Also who the fuck are you?” He snaps, hoping the cyborg kid or whatever the fuck he was would get pissed and leave.

The shaggy-haired mutant just laughs, “What is a name but an illusion against the ephemeral?” 

Before Todd can even think of how to reply to that grade A hippie-ism, the mutant mechanic plows on, “I’m Forge, we met when you high-jacked one of my old inventions. Thanks for the sweet ferrari to freedom, by the way.” 

Todd sneers, taking a drag off his cigarette, “Charmed I’m sure.” 

Forge seems to take this as an invitation and plops his ass down beside Todd, close enough their shoulders bump. Todd’s about to scoot away when the other mutant pulls out a bag of weed and casually begins rolling a blunt. Todd reconsiders his retreat, opting instead to lean back against the wall. 

“Light?” Forge asks, holding out a hand. 

Todd obliges, hoping a hit is in it for him. The soft gasp of Forge’s inhale mixes with the flick of the lighter. The two sit together in silence for a slow beat, the distant sound of a pick up soccer game echoing off the brick of the gym walls. Todd glances over at Forge to see the other mutant sitting with his head tilted back, eyes scanning the clouds. A smile curves the edges of his lips. 

“You know I couldn’t smoke there. Couldn’t eat either. Or sleep.” He says, apropos of nothing. 

Todd turns to full on stare at the other teen, at an utter loss about how the fuck he’s supposed to respond to that. Thankfully Forge saves him from figuring it out.

“What I meant to say is, this is the sweetest joint I have ever had in my life, and I owe you my thanks.” Forge says, turning to face Todd, holding the joint out. 

Not one to look a gift blunt in the mouth, Todd accepts it, flicking his now finished cigarette away to sputter out in a nearby mud puddle. He takes a deep drag, appreciating that it’s good shit even though he has not recently escaped a bizarre purgatory dimension.  
“Pretty sure furball is the one you should be thanking, not me dawg.” He says, voice creaking a bit with the smoke as he hands the joint back. 

Forge holds up a hand as he takes a second pull. “Already covered, he and I are copacetic. Regardless, you zapping the principal’s ferrari gave us a key avenue for escape my man, and you couldn’t have done that without at least sort of grasping the tech you were messing with beyond ‘hit button thing vanish’ which, brings me back to my opening point: You are wicked smart, man.” 

Todd looks away, hunching in on himself, studying the rust spots on the dumpster. He doesn’t want to see whatever punchline is coming here. He feels the other boy rock into his shoulder.

“Hey, hey, come back. I mean it.” Forge says, and Todd glances back at him.

“C’mon, I’d like to show you something. Unless you’d rather catch your class, that was the last lunch bell, yeah?” Forge says, already rocking to his feet and ambling down the field towards the far side of the campus. 

Todd glances lazily back towards the school, considering how much he cares about catching History class and deciding this pursuit is more interesting. 

“Nah, Mr. Harris’ class is shit anyway.” Todd replies, shaking pins and needles out his legs as he stands to follow Forge. 

Forge barks out a laugh, spinning to point at Todd, “That’s the spirit! I can’t believe that dinosaur colonizer is still spouting his bullshit here 20 years later!”

Todd snorts, “Yeah, fucker must know somebody. Geezer legit went on a tangent about Europe being the ideal society for "who they don't let in" and I thought fuzz was gonna launch out of his desk and deck him.” Todd swallows, chest tightening as he remembers the teacher’s sneer. 

“Shit man, did he? I wouldn’t blame him.” Forge asks, leading Todd past the old trees that line the campus. 

Todd snorts, “Goody two shoes, no. But did I help him fill the bastard’s desk with salt late that night? Yes. Only time I regret not being in that asshole’s first period. I heard he lost his shit cussing in class, face red and everything.” 

They’ve come up to what looks like a glorified brick shithouse, a small building barely wider than its door, there’s moss growing all in the gaps of the bricks. Forge has his hand on the rusted door handle, but he’s laughing too hard to stand, bent over double.

“That’s fucking incredible. You two are clearly a master pair.” He says, straightening up. 

Todd shrugs, “That’s a stretch.” 

Forge looks him over, eyebrow raised, but doesn’t say anything. Instead he wrenches open the door revealing--an empty shed.

“Ta-Da!” he says, and Todd raises an eyebrow.

“Did not all of you come back from that dimension?” He drawls.

Forge laughs, “I mean, I can’t guarantee it, but not because of this. We just need the right key.”

And then one brown arm suddenly opens, gleaming metal instruments forking out of smooth skin and Todd coughs stumbling backwards “What the absolute fuck man?” He croaks.

Forge shrugs, ruffling his hair with his non swissarmified hand, “Dunno, part of my mutation? Makes it real easy to build shit.” 

Todd winces, remembering all the times someone’s said shit about his hands, or tongue. Forge seems to read his regret off him and waves him off. 

“Dude, first time I opened up like this I wigged the fuck out. Kept randomly doing it for weeks, every time I was thinking on new schematics, it was a hassle. Scared the shit out of my friends.” He says, his face twisting a bit into something soft, but sore.

Todd does the math, realizing that all Forge’s friends probably have kids close to their age now. He swallows.

Forge seems to shake off the moment. Crouching to slot his thin metal arm bits into several grooves in the floor. 

“So I already checked, and by some gift of the universe, this place is still intact and running.” He says over the whirring hum coming from the floor. “But here’s the thing, I need help updating my kit. I catch on to technology quick, but things have changed so much, I’d rather have a guide and work smarter than harder.” 

Todd’s leaning over the other teen’s shoulder trying not to be as obviously interested as he feels as the floor slides open, revealing a four-foot square, surprisingly unrusted metal platform. 

Forge stands up, dusting off his knees before stepping on the platform. He jerks his head in invitation to the empty space beside him. Todd flicks his eyes back towards the distant outline of the school before turning back to size up what might be the weirdest shed he’s ever encountered. 

He sucks in a deep breath, hoping he’s not about to get Hannibal Lectered, and hoping if he does, that Lance doesn’t bring him back from the dead just to kill him again for not carrying the fucking cell phone Mystique chucked at his head. 

“You better not be a serial killer.” He says, stepping onto the platform.

“Scouts honor, not the Victor Frankenstein kind of scientist.” Forge says, holding one hand to his heart. “You ready?” 

Todd nods, and Forge shifts his foot, pressing a spot on the floor and the platform gives a lurch before sinking downwards. Todd’s grateful for a lifetime spent leaping off buildings keeping him on his feet. He shoots a bewildered look at Forge in the dim light. 

The mechanic smiles back, “So that guide bit is where you come in. You help me figure out modern tech, I show you what I know. We learn together, we use this lab together. Provided you like what you see, yeah?” 

Todd squints as the light abruptly brightens and the platform jerks to a stop, he turns, taking in the massive, tricked out time capsule of a laboratory in front of him, tables covered in half finished projects, blow torches, circuit boards, scrap metal, wire bits, machines that he can’t identify with their shells ripped open, and he feels something unfurl inside him. 

“You have yourself a deal, Dr. Freelove.” He breathes.

Forge laughs, tossing an arm around the amphibious mutant’s shoulder, “Fuck yeah, Froggy man, here’s to reveling in creation.”


	3. You live like this? Kurt & the Brotherhood

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is me taking the prompt about Kurt sneaking food into Todd's locker and going, "What if Kurt adopts the entire Brotherhood to spite his birth mother's clumsy butterfingers?" 
> 
> Because intercommunity care gets shit done y'all, featuring the Brotherhood flipping their house and some bonding with the Morlocks

A few months after a truly surreal team up in the woods, the furball is trailing behind the Kit Kat one afternoon when she comes over to the Brotherhood place to suck Lance’s face off. 

Pietro, in the usual fashion, bops back and forth in the doorway, blocking the blue mutant’s path. Todd, who’s lounging on top of the ancient TV, periodically moving the antennae depending on the grunts Freddy and Wanda make from the couch, can see the wiry blur of the speedster’s back as he jitters back and forth. Kitty passes through him and into Lance’s arms, earning an affronted squawk from Pietro, before the couple disappears out the back door. Kurt doesn’t get through so easily.

“Excuse me, I think you’re on the wrong side of town, Twinky Smurf.” He says.

Todd leans over, half falling off the TV to try and catch a glimpse of the blue teen’s reaction. His knee bumps the rabbit ears and Freddy and Wanda hiss like a pair of rattlesnakes. 

“Alright, alright, geez.” He grumbles, nudging them back into place. 

Whatever blue boy says, his voice is too low for Todd to catch over the noise of the TV beneath him, but Pietro goes still. 

“She’s not here right now.” Pietro says, voice reaching his “I am the boss here, my daddy says so.” register.

Kurt must be unmoved by Pietro’s big boy voice, because he murmurs something else and this time, to Todd’s shock, Pietro grumbles, but stops vibrating like a bad video game boss and let’s him through. Kurt steps into their dilapidated entryway, his eyes scanning over the place like he’s planning to break in later. Todd notes with a start that his enhancer is off, Blue fur out in the open. Wanda and Freddy have taken notice of the blue mutant’s entrance, but keep up the pretense of watching TV, heads turned to catch him in their peripheral. Freddy shoots a glance at Todd, who nods, shifting just a little bit on top of the TV. He stays loose, but moves in a way that he can jump smoothly if things call for it.

Kurt’s silent for several minutes, and in that time Todd’s skin begins to crawl as he takes in their home as a stranger might. Noting the musty, stained carpet that’s coming up at the corners, the flaking faded paint along the trim, the wallpaper cracking off and rolling down the wall at wet spots. All the faded grime he ignores because most of the time the lights come on and the roof stays up. The longer Kurt looks, the more he wants to kick the blue mutant. The longer Kurt looks, the more Todd wants to fade into the wall.

“This has always been like this?” Kurt asks. 

Todd suddenly wishes Lance were still here and not wherever he'd gone off to with Kitty. On the couch, Wanda's lowered the volume on the TV. She leans back to look at the blue mutant with that neutral mask face she puts on when she's making up her mind on whether to thrash someone's ass. Next to her, Freddy folds in on himself, hands twisting around each other in his lap. Todd feels anger boil hot in his gut, prickling over his skin like ants. 

“Well, we sure as shit don’t live like this on purpose, fuzznuts.” He snaps, and Kurt’s attention jerks to him.

He holds Todd’s glare for a moment, eyes wide before something softens in his expression. He lets out a breath and shakes his head, the long dark waves of his hair floofing out around him. 

“Forgive me, I spoke badly.” He says. “I mean. Mystique drives a Ferrari as Principal Darkholme,” He turns, jerking a thumb at Pietro, “Your father somehow has a verdammt helicopter, and I’m pretty sure was wearing a designer watch last time I tried to deck him, but somehow you all are living in a building where only one window out of the five I can see seems to close properly, the ceiling above our heads looks three more drips of water away from caving in, and I can’t tell if that’s mold on your walls or a sixth member of the Brotherhood I’ve never met before it’s that close to being a thinking being.” 

By the end of this rant, he’s turned a full circle in the hallway, pointing out each of the disaster areas as he names them. His tail is lashing behind him in agitated circles and the Brotherhood members have gone from various stages of pissed off and embarrassed to confused. 

The blue mutant seems to forget himself for a minute, bringing one hand to massage his forehead and hissing to himself loud enough that even Todd can hear him from across the room, “She really makes a hobby out of shit childcare.” 

Pietro, still standing a few feet away from Kurt, looks significantly at Wanda. From the way they both keep tilting their heads and making faces, Todd gathers they’re likely doing the creepy psychic teen thing they have. Freddy meanwhile turns a wide-eyed look back to Todd, exaggeratedly mouthing “WHAT?” Todd can only shrug, equally lost as to what’s crawled up the furry mutant’s ass and bit him. 

Kurt claps his hands together loud enough that Todd lands on the ceiling. Pietro shoots clear to the other side of the room ending up at Wanda’s elbow. Freddy jumps to his feet. Wanda fires off one of her zappy red energy pain things, which Kurt somehow ducks like it's a dodgeball, not magic. 

Kurt, for his part, winces again, holding up his hands. “Ah, sorry, I am not good at this.”

“Right, I will help you fix this.” He says.

Pietro loses it before anyone else can get a chance. 

“Excuse me, who says we need your ‘help’ goody two shoes?” He snaps, “Why would we take help from the enemy?” 

“One, I do not wear shoes. Two. You have accepted my help before. Three. We are not enemies, just because your dad and the Professor have some weird romantic drama.” Kurt replies, ticking off each number on a finger. Todd wonders if he stops counting only because he’s run out of fingers.

From the couch, Wanda lets out a whooping screech that it takes Todd a minute to process as a laugh. The sound bubbles out of her, loud and genuinely joyful as she grips the couch like she might fall off. Todd’s struck for the umpteenth time since it happened, with relief again that he told her the truth about her dad’s Jedi mind trick shit. The first couple weeks had been hell in the Brotherhood house, but telling Wanda the truth seemed to shift the entire Brotherhood. No one had come out and said it, but there seemed to be an unspoken rule in the air now. No matter what Buckethead or boss lady said, they’d do their work, but the Brotherhood was on the Brotherhood’s side. They were here for each other, no one else. 

Wanda wipes her eyes with a ring-clad knuckle, gasping as she looks at Pietro. “Looks like he’s got you there, P.” 

Pietro crosses his arms shifting his feet apart in what Todd’s come to understand as his “doubling down” posture. 

“Our dad does not have ‘romantic tension’” Pietro says, holding his hands up in scare quotes, “with fucking Baldy McFakeness. And we have tried to kill each other on multiple occasions. Pretty sure that makes us enemies.” 

Todd tenses on the ceiling. Freddy who’d relaxed at Wanda’s laughing fit, tenses again, looking down with a deep frown. Wanda rumbles a low warning at Pietro, who huffs and waves her off. Kurt is the only one who appears unphased by the assertion, turning fully to face Pietro.

“I have enough family issues of my own I’m not going to push you on that first part. Whatever helps you sleep at night, Zoomen.” He says, and Todd has to cover a laugh as Pietro mouths “Zoomen” to himself.

“But I have never tried to kill any of you, rough up yes. Kill no.” Kurt continues, “And none of you have tried to kill me. Trust me. I know what that looks like and you don’t come close.” 

The room’s gone eerily still. Kurt’s voice stays casual, as if he’s commenting on school gossip, but he holds Pietro’s gaze with a gravity too deep for the comment to feel like a joke. Freddy breaks the silence, clapping the same way Kurt had before, though thankfully he softens his clap so the sound is more of a thump that a deafening crack. Everyone still jumps a bit as if shaking off a spell before their eyes slide to the tall boy.

“So, what does help look like?” Freddy asks, voice going shy and soft. 

Todd snorts, ducking his head to hide a smile. Freddy’d been the first one to side with Kurt in the woods that day too, arguing he was the only Brotherhood member who knew shit about the woods in the first place, and with Lance off chasing Major Lazer, this let them keep an eye on the other X-Geeks. Kurt had beamed up at Freddy then, his smile like the moon breaking through the clouds at night. He smiles again now, the guarded tension Todd hadn’t even realized he was holding himself with melting out of him. 

“I have some ideas, we can talk, ja?” He answers.

And that’s how it begins. 

Turns out, the furball’s ideas involve carpentry, dumpster diving, and something he keeps calling “communing” which Todd’s pretty sure is not what he means, but what the fuck does he know about building relationships with people. 

It starts with the blue mutant introducing the Brotherhood to one of the most beautiful and terrifying women Todd’s ever met in his young life. Her name is Callisto, but Todd mentally refers to her as knife queen, and she leads this entire underground mutant gang, the Morlocks. 

Callisto feels like the anti-Mystique. Just as sharp, as commanding, but every time one of her team comes to her, Todd notices the way she opens up, the way she focuses on them with all her attention. The sharp, hard parts of her seem to wrap around them like a shield. The Morlocks for their part, seem to worship her for this, lapping up the attention like water. The way the Morlocks treat each other feels even worse. No matter how strange any of them look, sound, or move, they hold each other like family. Even the members who don’t seem that close to each other still nod and talk with an easy warmth. They all move like no matter what happens, if one of them falls, the others will pick them up. 

Todd feels something prickly twist in his chest when he watches them together, a hunger like the days where one meal a day is lucky to have. He tries to cover it with a snarl and biting words whenever the Brotherhood is working with the Morlocks. But after the third or fourth meeting, there’s a moment Callisto looks at him while the others are all talking, and Todd feels something break open in his chest. Her expression isn’t overly warm, she doesn’t smile at him like a mom in those coffee commercials, her eyes aren’t glimmering with affection. But there’s a knowing in her dark eyes, and a faint curve to her lips as she ducks her head towards him. When she shifts where she’s sitting on a row of old crates, making room beside her, Todd takes the invitation. The rest of that meeting, he can’t shut of the way her warmth radiates through his side, how her arm casually brushes against his as she’s gesturing. The way their knees bump together a few times. The touching isn’t on purpose, but that’s why it rings through him like a bell. She doesn’t go out of her way to touch Todd, but she doesn’t go out of her way to avoid him either. None of the Morlocks avoid touching Todd. Or any of the Brotherhood. The little kids run up to them, asking Freddy to swing them around, or peppering Pietro with questions. The kids their age egg Todd into joining pick up ball games, or sit and paint with Wanda. The adults all move in and out of their space like it’s nothing, bumping arms, patting shoulders, even tousling their hair. Todd can’t bring himself to complain about it.

Kurt initially introduces the two gangs, but fades into the background after the first couple meetings, and anytime he’s around when they meet feels more incidental than intentional.  
Lance brokers the deal with Callisto and the Morlocks. The Brotherhood does work for the Morlocks on the surface that is way riskier for the gang to take on, in turn, the Morlocks share their resources with the Brotherhood, including showing them where to get shit like food, clothes, and materials. A few of them even help with the home repairs. Todd knew enough about wiring not to burn the house down fixing the oven or the lighting, but the Morlocks help them figure out pipes and know which walls are necessary and where they can take a sledgehammer to shit. 

Because the furball is full of surprises, the place he does keep showing up on purpose is for the home repairs. Turns out, growing up splitting time traveling with a circus and living in bumfuck nowhere Germany meant he’d learned a lot of handy things from his parents. So he’s there for almost every project, cheering alongside the Brotherhood when Freddy launches himself Koolaid man style through some rotting drywall they need to tear out. He helps them kill the mold in the walls, and knows a shitton about woodworking and weirdly, upholstery, helping them bolster their beatass furniture with two by fours, foam and thrift store curtains. He pushes Todd to wear a ventilator mask when they’re stripping wood, and helps Wanda pick paint colors. He teases Lance about his million safety checks and begins matching all Pietro’s snipes with his own. 

So the day Mystique shows up as they’re spray painting a mural on the wall, Freddy holding the ladder and Kurt dutifully passing Todd his stencils on command, Todd actually forgets the blue mutant isn’t technically supposed to be there with them, painting on a lazy Friday afternoon. 

Mystique blows through the door, snapping like she hasn’t been gone the last four months without a word or even a fucking check for groceries beyond a thin wad of hundreds that didn’t make it past the first month and a half. 

“You idiots, better not--” She starts in, before her voice cuts out as she stares at the three teens in the entryway. 

Todd hears the ladder creak under Freddy’s grip as the younger mutant swallows nervously. The air seems to suck out of his lungs all at once. He feels frozen with his eyes on Mystique, one hand pinning a stencil to the wall, the other holding a can of gold spraypaint. He’s grateful for how much of his face the ventilator mask obscures. 

Behind him, he hears Kurt sigh in that way Todd’s come to think of as his “bitchy fashion designer” sigh. 

Mystique bites out “Why are you here?” Right when Pietro zooms to the top of the stairs from the second floor. 

“What the fuck are you guys doing? I can’t hang my posters level with you banging shit around.” He snaps, before making a panicked chicken noise Todd would have laughed at if he wasn’t terrified himself, “Mystique.” 

The glare she shoots at Pietro makes Todd shocked the paint doesn’t peel right back off the walls. She turns a baleful look on each of them before her gold eyes laser focus back in on Kurt.

“I repeat, why are you here?” Mystique asks, her voice like iron.

Kurt bewilderingly is unmoved, sighing before unspooling his tail from the chandelier and somersaulting to the floor.

“What can I say? Design is my passion.” He answers breezily, as if he is not facing a supervillain wearing paint-covered overalls with his hair up in a ridiculous purple butterfly clip.

“Leave.” She says to him, shoving past the trio in the hall to storm up the stairs. “We have a mission. And you idiots better not have touched my room.”

Pietro scrambles out of her way as she skulks past him, and Todd and Freddy hurry to follow in her wake. Kurt continues to act like he’s been body swapped with a put upon housewife, huffing as he trails after the three Brotherhood members. 

Upstairs, Lance’s door swings open and his head pops out, his mouth hilariously sparkling with glitter lipgloss. Wanda too, leans curiously out from her room, a paintbrush in hand, a mossy green stripe on her cheek. Mystique stomps all the way to her door, twisting the knob like it’s the neck of her enemies before shoving her head inside. 

“It’s untouched.” She says, at once sounding disappointed and like it’s expected. 

“You didn’t touch their space, why should we have touched yours?” Kurt’s voice answers.

In unison, Freddy, Pietro and Todd jump out of the way, leaving the narrow hallway open for the two blue mutants to face off. Kurt leans casually against the wall, arms crossed as he looks Mystique over like she’s a particularly unimpressive insect. Mystique for her part, glares at him as if she might suddenly manifest pyrokinetic powers. Her jaw twitches before she looks away to sweep her eyes again over the Brotherhood. 

“We leave tonight. Be ready.” She says.

“Good luck on your mission. Be careful. Remember the caulk on the downstairs sink still needs to cure til tomorrow morning.” Kurt says, giving Todd’s shoulder a squeeze and bumping Pietro’s arm. “I’ll check in later on, see if you wanna finish that mural.”

Kurt pushes off from the wall, moving down the hallway to collect Kitty, who darts out from Lance's doorway to stand beside him, never turning her back on Mystique, and Rogue, who slips out from Wanda’s doorway to stand just behind Kurt. She pointedly avoids the blue woman’s gaze, shifting her head to keep her eyes just out of sight.

He turns back to Mystique, and Todd wishes he could see the look on the blue mutant’s face as he speaks. 

“They’ve worked hard to be a good team. Without you.” He says, “Try not to drop anybody off a bridge, ja?” 

Kitty and Rogue’s eyes widen, but their startled laughter is cut off as the blue mutant teleports the trio away, leaving a bewildered Brotherhood to stare at one another. Mystique’s face looks as pale as the blue woman could be, her lips pressed in a thin line. 

Silence crushes down on them, before Mystique snaps “Be ready at 6.” and retreats into her room, slamming the door behind her.

The Brotherhood collectively wheeze out a sigh, expecting a terrible night. 

They’re bewildered when Mystique is possibly the nicest she’s ever been to them. Nicest she’s ever been meaning she hardly talks except to snap terse instructions, and actually asks if any of them are injured as they all crowd back into the helicopter at dawn. The mission was tense, but nobody died, a shady anti-mutant base burned to the ground, and Mystique seemed satisfied at the end, talking lowly over a cell phone with her contacts.

She’s gone the next morning. But this time, there are checks made out to each of the utility companies for the next three months, dollar amounts left blank for Todd to forge her handwriting in. A thicker stack of hundreds with a scribbled-on napkin that reads “don’t die” is shoved under a mostly drained coffee mug. 

The Brotherhood huddle in the kitchen, in exhausted, baffled silence, before Freddy breaks the stillness. 

“I’m making that weird puffy pancake Kurt showed me how to do.” He says, turning towards the stove.

“I’ll make eggs.” Pietro says before Wanda and Lance both cut him off. 

“You will burn eggs because you can’t stand still for the two minutes it takes to fry them.” Lance grumbles, snatching the skillet from Pietro’s hands.

Todd’s edging towards the doorway, planning to catch more sleep on the couch when Lance wields the skillet in his direction.

“Not so fast, this is the one kitchen thing you can do, Kermit.” Lance says, shoving the skillet into his hands. "You make eggs."

Todd sighs, and half-heartedly snaps at Wanda’s hand as she ruffles his hair, but takes his place at the counter next to Freddy. Behind them, Pietro kicks on the old radio Todd fixed up. Todd smiles to himself as they all quietly start to hum along.

And if their hum along turns into Brotherhood Kitchen Karaoke by the third song, well, that’s a Brotherhood secret.


	4. Big Men Deserve Beautiful Clothes: Freddy Goes Shopping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Yeah I'm just making up Kurt's circus family now. Kurt's over the top and goofy, but clever and caring and I imagine he has a sprawling extended circus family who're just as much those things in their own way. I also love the idea of Kurt's X-men life and Circus life colliding and the circus adults all deciding "These are our chaotic children now."
> 
> I have a bullshit headcanon that they all end up in Europe for a bit during the whole Apocalypse fiasco, and this introduces the American Mutants to a lot of what's happening for mutants in Europe as well as just how much shenanigans Kurt gets up to in the summer.
> 
> I wanted to circle back to Freddy again, this time around a shopping trip, I hate how much fatphobia the show has around Freddy's character and wanted to take more time with him again. That in mind, content warnings for the fatphobia around finding clothing.

Freddy drags his feet behind the rest of the teens as they step into the tailor’s warehouse. The others had all been chatting excitedly the whole walk from the train, curious about what they’d find at the place where Kurt’s circus sourced all their costumes. Kurt’s parents had mentioned something about all the kids getting to take some clothes today, including the Brotherhood, and when Mystique tried to argue, she’d been waved off with a smile that looked like a threat from Kurt’s mom. 

The others had all been so excited about everything, and when Freddy tried to stay behind, no one would have it. He’d gotten a concerned glance from Todd, and one of Lance’s Mom Talks, where he extracted a promise from Freddy of “If it’s not good for you, and you can’t find anything there, say so, and we go. That’s that.” 

But Freddy’d crossed his fingers behind his back. The other Brotherhood kids had just as little good clothes as he did, and he didn’t want to spoil a chance for them to get new stuff. So he planned to putter around the place while everyone else got stuff and act surprised when he didn’t find anything that fit him.

So when Sven, the strongman who’s a couple years other than all of them, materializes out of nowhere to clap Freddy on the shoulder once everyone scatters, Freddy yelps. 

“Hello, baby strongman! I’m happy you came along. I had to come here from home today, so I couldn’t be part of the cat herding to get you all here.” Sven says.

The man has a way of talking that makes each sentence sound like he wants to yell, but is restraining himself because they’re inside. But it’s a friendly kind of yelling that makes Freddy smile. 

“Yeah, the other’s all wanted me to come, I figured I’d just hang out here til they’re done.” Freddy says, and Sven frowns.

“You do not want new clothes, my friend?” He asks, gesturing widely at the racks and racks of clothing and fabric piled in the warehouse.

Freddy shrugs, “I dunno. I figure nothing will fit me here. They clothe tiny circus people.” 

Sven scoffs, playfully smacking Freddy on the shoulder before jumping backwards. 

“Excuse me, big man. I am tiny circus people?” He asks, voice rising a bit as he smacks his own chest with a muffled thump. 

Freddy pauses, catching for the first time how Sven, and the other strongman, Dimiti, didn’t have to look up to him. Sven turns sideways, and cups his belly in his hands, jiggling it. He waggles his eyebrows at Freddy while shimmying. 

“Am I tiny circus person?” Sven asks, and Freddy cracks, a giggle escaping his lips. 

“No.” He says, softly.

Sven smacks his arm again, playful swats seeming to be his expression of approval. 

“Exactly! And you know where I get my clothes? Here.” Sven says, then leans forward with the loudest whisper Freddy’s ever heard, “Price and quality is way better than any “Biggy Tall store” Way more fashionable too. Come, with me.” 

He takes Freddy by the arm, steering him deeper into the warehouse as he bellows, “Baji!!” You shaggy cat in a tuxedo, where are you? Come help!”   
Freddy covers his ear but can’t help laughing at the strongman’s antics. The American mutants had figured out by the third day of their stay with Captain Britain and the kids who’d been working with him, Piotri, Kitty, Pixie, Rahn and Spyke that Kurt’s circus family were speaking English for their benefit, switching to Sinte Romani or German as little as possible. 

Baji, for his part emerges from a back room and is neither a tiny circus person, or a shabby cat in a tuxedo, by Freddy’s standard. Shorter than Sven, but just as broad and fat in a way similar to Freddy, Baji looks as if he walks to work on a runway. In a bright floral blue and fuschia button up with the sleeves rolled up to reveal warm brown forearms, and slacks that look like they have some kind of velvet lace pattern on them. He has a close cropped, thick black beard that gleams in the light and thick eyebrows. Baji strides up as if Sven is the cat making himself a nuisance.

He pulls up to a stop an arms length away from the pair, shooting Sven an annoyed look before turning an analytical eye to Freddy. 

“Sven, do not shout in my warehouse as if a murder is happening, you give my team fits.” He says, before sticking out his hand to Freddy, “Baji, fashion king, tailor extraordinar. You are one of Mäuschen’s talented American friends, yes?” 

Freddy nods, bashful again as he shakes the other man’s hand. Baji’s hands are warm and calloused. “Freddy, Freddy Dukes.”

“He’s the strong one! Can pick up a bus!” Sven says, jostling Freddy’s bicep.

Baji rolls his eyes, “You cannot recruit everyone who picks up a bus, schatzi. The troupe has four strongmen as it is, what will you all do? Pick up a skyscraper?” 

Sven, unphased, beams at him, “A good idea! We’d really be famous. But, no, first, this man needs clothes!” he says, slapping Freddy on the back.

Freddy starts, attempting to stutter either an excuse or something else, he doesn’t know, when Baji gently waves a hand to stop him. He slips a long cord from around his neck, stretching it out between his hands. He pulls a small pencil and notebook out of his pocket and tosses it to Sven.

“You remember how to take notes, ja?” He asks but turns back to Freddy before Sven even nods a yes.

“Do you mind removing your coat for me, Freddy?” Baji asks and Freddy obliges, Sven plucking it from his hands and folding it before setting it over a nearby chair. “Danke, now tell me, what are your favorite colors?” 

Freddy shrugs, but Baji rolls his hand at him expectantly, so he tries again, “I dunno. I like light blue, and that green moss is. And yellow, not that bright yellow, but that quieter one.”   
Baji glances to Sven, who’s now perched in the chair, as if to make sure he’s writing things down. Sven gives him a sunny thumbs up and Baji rolls his eyes before turning back to Freddy.

“Now let’s talk clothes. I’m old, you are my ears to the ground. Tell me what is cool.” He asks, as he begins to circle Freddy, cord in hand. 

And that’s how the next half an hour seems to go. Baji asking Freddy questions about fabric or colors, or what he likes, and occasionally asking to touch him before walking his hand down across Freddy’s shoulders or down his side. He periodically calls out what Freddy thinks are numbers, but can’t be sure. Sven spends the whole encounter diligently scribbling on the notepad. Finally, Baji draws to a stop in front of him, popping up straight and clapping his hands. Abruptly Freddy remember’s Kurt doing the same thing months ago the first time he stepped foot in the Brotherhood home, and he has to bite his lip to avoid laughing. 

“I think we are ready!” Baji says, before raising his voice and calling, “Anis, Manful!”

A short, sweetheart faced young woman maybe Sven’s age, and a tall reedy man a bit older than them peel away from a workroom where maybe ten or so people are puttering away at sewing machines, computers and massive tables. 

Manful only grunts in acknowledgment, giving Freddy a crooked smile hello, while Anis is chipper, immediately asking, “Yes, uncle?” 

Baji hands her the notes from Sven he’d been reviewing, before gesturing to Freddy. 

“Our man’s specifications, please, both of you, pull some options for him. Fight it out over your opinions like you always do, then bring us back what survives.” Sven says. 

The pair nod before vanishing into the depths of the warehouse. Freddy looks on bewildered, but Baji waves him off once more, gesturing to a chair. Freddy sits.

“I don’t want to make extra work.” Freddy says.

“There is no extra work! We cannot make everything we sell, we salvage. We outsource the bases and then we modify for perfection and that is all that’s stored here.” Baji explains, gesturing widely. “No one finds things here except my team, several help your friends now. We help you too.”

Freddy looks down at his sneakers for a minute, sucking in a deep breath and ignoring the way his eyes sting. Baji’s hand comes into his vision, squeezing his knee before releasing him with a pat.

“You look good now, but today, we polish you. A fine man will walk out of here.” Baji says.

Freddy sniffs, huffing out a laugh before he sits up, nodding, “Okay.” 

Baji’s face crinkles in a smile. “Yes, good.” 

Sven gives Freddy a pat on the shoulder before turning to Baji with a mischievous glint in his eye, “Baji, can I show him the trick while we wait?” 

Baji shoots the younger man a sour look, “If you do, we do not fix the mess you make, you know how to do that.” 

Sven holds up his hands, “Yes yes, understood.”

One of the tailor people must have overhead them, because he appears with a dress shirt in hand, casually helping Sven slide it on before slipping once more back to the workroom. Sven quickly buttons the shirt up before looking up at Freddy.

“Now, you notice something about the shirt?” Sven asks.

The shirt in question is a vibrant emerald green with lavender flowers scrolling across it, but that isn’t what Sven is looking for Freddy guesses. He shrugs. 

“It uh, looks a little bit too tight?” Freddy says, wincing as he glances at Baji, not wanting to offend the man. 

Sven beams at him, “Don’t worry, you haven’t caused an insult. This is by design. The circus is full of tricks and Baji is a master magician himself. Now tell me, you like girls? Boys? Both?”

Caught of guard Freddy looks back to Sven, before stammering out, “Uh girls, mostly, yeah. Why?” 

“Because I’m going to show you a trick that will get girls falling in your arms!” Sven says winking. 

Baji snorts from his vantage point sifting through paperwork on a nearby lounge chair. He looks at Freddy over his glasses. 

“I assure you, my young friend, women are looking for more than parlor tricks and muscles.” Baji says, waving his pen at Sven, “This one here can’t talk to a pretty woman without turning into a cherry. Watch him when Anis comes back!” 

Sven’s ears turn red, and he twists to pout at Baji, who is unmoved. He sticks his tongue out at the older man before turning back to Freddy.

“Anyway, watch.” Sven says, and then he flexes. 

There’s a series of pops and then Sven’s shirt is spreading apart at the arm seams, revealing the thick cords of muscle on his biceps and the swirling tattoos there. Sven twists, flexing in a different position, and the top three buttons of his shirt fly off, rolling away on the floor. Freddy hears Baji mutter to himself at that, something about sweeping.

Sven pops up out of his pose, holding out his hands in a Ta da and Freddy laughs, clapping obligingly.

“Being strong is all good, but sometimes it helps to play things up.” Sven says, before walking over and showing Freddy his shirt close up. 

“Look here, these pieces are made to come apart, without being ruined.” He explains, running a finger along the arm fabric. “I flex they pop open, later that night, with weak thread, I stitch them back together. Boom! Ready for tomorrow night all again! Very handy.”

“You mean no one’s actually just tearing their shirts?” Freddy asks, and the two older men look at each other, smiling. 

“Maybe fools with extra money who like struggling.” Baji answers, “But my clients, no. We make trick sleeve, blouses, pants, you name it, you can rip it with your muscles.” 

Anis and Manful come back then with armfuls of clothes, depositing them in a room behind a small curtain. As she passes, Anis winks at Sven and sure enough, the man turns bright red, ducking his head with a smile. Baji catches Freddy’s eye and mouths “I told you” behind the strongman’s back.

“Go, your new closet awaits.” Baji says, gesturing to the fitting room. “Only discard what you find ugly. If you like it, but it doesn’t fit, put it aside, we can work with it! No limits today, keep everything you want.” 

“But I--” Freddy starts, and Baji holds up a hand.

“You, you spend your days helping people.” Baji says, “Let people help you too.” 

Freddy frowns, looking away, but Baji places a hand on his arm. 

“I know, Mäuschen does not lie, you have done less good things before. But again, Mäuschen talks.” Baji says, “I know how much harder it is to be a good man from hard times. But here you are. A strong man being in the streets for those who cannot.” 

Freddy doesn’t trust his voice, so he simply nods, before ducking into the changing room.

An hour later, he’s standing with the others, two massive shopping bags on his arm. Baji pats him on the shoulder.

“I know where Mäuschen is staying, I call him when the rest of your things are ready. If you all go back to America before then, he packs them.” Baji says, then gasps surprised as Freddy swoops him up in a hug.

“Thank you.” Freddy says, voice choked, and Baji pats him on the back. 

“Of course, my friend.” Baji whispers.

They part and Freddy pivots to Sven, but the young man is ready, colliding with Freddy just as fast as Freddy can open his arms.

“Big men deserve big beautiful clothes.” Sven says, a smile in his voice. 

“And that means me too.” Freddy says as they pull back and Sven beams at him.

On the way back, Freddy walks in the front of the group, talking just as much as everyone else.


	5. An Almost Kiss: Kurt & Todd (& Tabby)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's about the yearning *fist clench* 
> 
> In this house, we practice ethical nonmonogamy. 
> 
> Also, in the comics Kurt can not only teleport but phase through shadows, which is cool as shit and underused to the point people forget he can. So we're bringing that back here.
> 
> Warning for allusions to angst in this chapter in reference to Magneto's experimentations on Kurt as a baby, and the potential consequences that may have for little boy blue.
> 
> Also reclamation of the word Qu**r as an identity term, it is not censored in the chapter.

“Hey, where’s my kiss?” Todd asks, stopping his lazy rotation in the rickety spinning chair he and Forge use at their massive computer setup. 

Tabby, perched in Kurt’s lap, brushes her lips against his once more rather than answer Todd at first. Kurt smothers the whine in his throat, but can’t help the way his lips chase hers.

Kurt doesn’t miss the mischievous look Tabby sends him as she pulls away from their kiss. Forge had gone up to the lab’s surface to help Lance retrieve some supplies from his Jeep, and it was just the three of them. His heart skips a beat as she smirks at Todd.

“Come and get it.” She says, still firmly planted in Kurt’s lap, one arm around his shoulder. 

Todd sits up straight, looking surprised as the tips of his ears flush red. Kurt’s grateful his own blush is hidden by the deep blue of his skin and fur and the shadows that cling to him. Tabby’s fingers are at the nape of his neck, combing through the short curls of his undercut. He’s torn between melting at the touch and vibrating with electricity waiting to see what Todd does. 

Tabby spent the most time with Amara, an endeavor aided by the girls being able to share a room when Tabby stayed at the mansion because apparently the adults either forgot queer kids were a thing or decided ignoring it was easier than trying to house everyone in a way to minimize all canoodling. A fact that Kurt was grateful for back in freshman year when he and Evan had wiled away more than one dull afternoon boosting each other’s kissing skills. 

But since Kurt had broken up with Amanda, things had bloomed, playful and easy, between him and Tabby. A blessing that had soothed the ache in his chest that he and Amanda’s relationship had left. This had an added perk of giving him and Amara more to bond over and also meant the girls had come to him for some very awkward first aid when things getting heavy led to some power misfires. This arrangement had carried on rather blissfully from the end of junior year to now, halfway through their senior year.

But one night a month ago, Kurt let slip a question he wasn’t sure he should have. He’d known Tabby was what she referred to as “make out bros” with Todd sometimes. The amphibious mutant also apparently had a kind of arrangement with Wanda, which Kurt had a hunch may have been connected to the fight he’d had with Todd that ended with him snapping at him that “He could just ask girls to be mean to him if he was into that, rather than tormenting them til he snapped.” Neither of them had brought the conversation up again, but Kurt noticed things between Todd and Wanda smoothed over shortly after.

Kurt had gotten a lot of time to notice the ways Todd had smoothed over in the last year and a half. Between forcibly becoming the Brotherhood’s redecorator, and spending time down in the lab, first just for Forge’s experiments, but then helping both mechanically minded mutants he hadn’t noticed a little frog-shaped space growing in his heart.

So when, a bit drunk on the pleasant tingling buzz that comes from making out on a roof in the middle of the night with a beautiful girl who made him laugh til he choked, he’d asked Tabby what sort of kisser Todd was, Kurt didn’t catch himself til it was too late.

Tabby’d sat up on one elbow from where she’d been cuddled against him, her eyes scanning him in the starlight. Kurt had frozen, some part of his brain forgetting that romantic partners did not work like predators, and remaining still did not render him invisible to their eyes. Thankfully, or terribly, Tabby knew him well enough by now to know this was not a question of jealousy, or insecurity. Unfortunately, that meant it took less than five minutes of her staring at Kurt to parse out this question was one of desire. 

“I knew it!” She crowed, before immediately ducking back onto the roof, pulled down by Kurt. 

The two froze, listening, before sure enough, they heard the crunch of Logan’s boots on the gravel path in the garden below. 

“Go to bed.” He growled, not bothering to raise his voice, knowing Kurt would hear him. “And don’t complain about how early the training session is in the morning you two.” 

“Shit!” Tabby mouthed at him, smiling. 

“Your fault!” Kurt mouthed back, laughing silently, as he pulled the two of them through the shadows, slipping into that quiet dark place, and depositing Tabby in her and Amara’s room before heading back to his own, trying not to look at Evan’s empty bed.

Because he was a fool, he’d thought himself safe from further questions thanks to their rendezvous being interrupted. But the next day, Tabby cornered him at lunch at school, dragging him under the bleachers and wringing out of him that yes, maybe, possibly, he had developed a little tiny crush on Todd. But he’d sworn her to secrecy. To Tabby’s eternal frustration. For reasons he could not fully give her.

She’d pressed him about it again last week, but he’d held his ground. Insisting that he and Todd’s friendship was tenuous enough as it was, he didn’t want to make a mess of things. That he doubted the amphibious mutant was even interested. Arguing that he still struggled not to jump to the worst conclusions when it came to Todd’s actions, and he deserved someone who could see him. 

He left off the fact that his mutation might be out of control, all because Todd’s supervillain bosses played Dr. Frankenstein with his baby self, and he might be on borrowed time. He didn’t mention he felt guilty enough for every beautiful stolen moment he found in Tabby’s arms, and didn’t think he could bear adding Todd to the list of people hurt if he disappears, or worse, twists into some unrecognizable, mad version of himself. 

Tabby had squinted, as if sensing the yawning void his omission left, but let things lie. Or so Kurt thought.

Until now, with Tabby sitting, warm and heavy in his lap, looking over at Todd with an invitation in her eyes. Todd glances at Kurt, and the blue mutant freezes before a laugh falls from his lips and he shrugs helplessly. They both no, one on earth can argue with Tabby when she chooses something. 

“Okay.” Todd says, voice squeaking a bit as he clears his throat, before pushing out of his chair and ambling towards the pair on the couch.

When he gets close, Tabby darts forward, looping her free arm around Todd’s shoulders and drawing him off balance. Todd flails, his hand finding Kurt’s shoulder for support, and without thinking Kurt palm’s Todd’s waist to steady him. Every fingertip feels like a brand on his shoulder, too much and at once not enough, never enough. He can feel the muscles in Todd’s stomach jump under his hand, and swallows. Before he can pull away or manage to think coherently, Tabby’s lips are on Todd’s. 

Kurt watches, entranced. Todd seems to forget his own shyness, his free hand coming up to cup Tabby’s face as he deepens the kiss. Tabby’s fingers are tangled in his brown hair. Todd tilts his head and his lips part, teeth catching Tabby’s bottom lip. She gasps, a sigh whose wanting meaning Kurt is so familiar with. Tabby darts out her tongue, licking her way into Todd’s mouth, and he makes a low noise deep in his throat, pressing forward to catch her lips with his. 

Kurt forgets how to breathe, weighed down by Tabby in his lap, pinned by the pair's hands on him, Tabby’s at his neck, still buried in his hair, Todd’s on his shoulder, kneading there absentmindedly. They break apart just barely, and Tabby shoots Kurt a sly glance before smiling up at Todd, peeking at him through her lashes.  
“Satisfied?” she asks, and Kurt’s unsure which of them she’s asking. 

Todd lets out a shaky breath, turning a bit. He freezes, apparently realizing how close he and Kurt are. Kurt stares back, too breathless to feel embarrassed. This close, he can see the brilliant red bleeding into the gold of Todd’s eyes, the horizontal blobby line his pupils make blown so wide they’re nearly round. He sways towards Todd, or maybe Todd sways towards him, he can’t tell. But they’re a hairsbreadth apart when there’s several heavy thuds and the sound of Lance and Forge bickering fills the room.

The world comes rushing back. He and Todd seem to realize where they are and how close they are at the same time. Both swing back, dropping contact so swiftly Kurt aches with the loss. Between them, Tabby groans, unabashedly disappointed.

“Hey, Wagner, can you port some of this shit down here, we realized it’s too big for the elevator.” Lance says.

At the same time Forge goes, “Something up, combustible queen?” 

Tabby just sighs, slumping off Kurt’s lap and onto the couch. 

“Just an issue of timing.” she says. 

Lance and Forge share a baffled look. Kurt purposefully looks anywhere but at Todd. He thanks the powers above that he manages to stand without either collapsing or showing off an obvious boner. 

“I can get it, no problem.” He says.

“Drop it in the back storage room!” He hears Forge call as he ports away.

Outside, the air is crisp and damp in a way that hints of spring’s existence. He breathes deep gulps of air, sweeping hands through his hair as he wills his brain to reboot. If he takes longer than strictly needed to port the new scrap pieces down, that’s between him and the trees. 

When he emerges from the storage room, things feel mostly back to normal, Todd’s riffing with Forge about what they’ll do with the new stuff and Lance and Tabby are tossing in improbable suggestions from the couch. 

As he joins them, he hears Tabby mutter, potentially for his benefit, “Third time’s the charm.” 

He pretends not to hear.


	6. Torpor: To Warm Bitch Winter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is one of possibly two answers to the Torpor prompt. This one building off the previous chapter on home renovation.
> 
> Warnings for Kitty and Kurt being weirdos who have a gross conversation about rats. As well as minor panic over a medical emergency in a flashback

“How do we make the house not freezing in winter?” Lance bursts out one day, about three weeks after the last bizarre mission with Mystique, on a crisp fall day that’s just beginning to hint at winter.

Todd winces, staring down at the tiles he and Wanda are laying in the upstairs bathroom. Wanda glances up at him, her mouth creased in what stands as her “caring frown,” before she nudges him with one gritty elbow. 

Salvaged from a moldering box dumped behind the local hardware store, the Brotherhood had painted over their unremarkable white in a riot of colors, rendering them potentially more an eyesore than before. But the boys had caught Wanda muttering to herself “The hospital was always white.” when they’d opened the box, and that was all it took to decide to paint them. 

He shakes his head and goes back to smearing grout on the bare floor, keeping an eye and ear on where Kurt and Lance are talking in the doorway. Kurt tips his head thoughtfully up at the ceiling, clicking his tongue. 

“That depends. We have the boiler up and working reliably again, so we can double-check the radiator system, but looking over the insulation and closing up gaps in the windows can help keep the heat in.” He says, rocking back and forth a bit. 

“And how much time and money is that?” Todd grouses from the floor, and the two standing youths look back at him, Kurt faintly concerned and Lance annoyed.

“It costs what it costs, Todd. We’re not doing what happened the last two winters.” Lance snaps.

Kurt glances back and forth between the two mutants with increasing confusion. Wanda tries to catch his eye from the floor, but Todd’s already up in Lance’s face.

“There’s so much shit to fix, it’s stupid to waste money on something that’s mostly my problem.” He says. “I can just wear a jacket.” 

“So what, you’ll just be mostly comatose instead of a little comatose?” Lance snarls. 

Todd doesn’t have a comeback, but anger is too hot in his chest and he can’t just let this be, so he snarls back wordlessly, smacking the grout spade to the floor before lunging past the teens in the doorway and hopping to his room. He slams the door, but they’d just painted it this morning and hadn’t put the knob back on, so it bounces against the frame before swinging back open.

He belly flops onto his bed, trying to ignore Wanda’s irritated grumbling and Lance’s frustrated stomps. He hears music begin drifting up from downstairs and knows Freddy’s turned on the radio in the kitchen. Guilt wriggles in his gut like maggots, but he can’t bring himself to move. The others keep talking in the hallway like he didn’t just throw a hissy fit and storm out.

He doesn’t catch all of what Lance says, because the boy is the only one of them outside of Freddy who can actually whisper, but snippets of “unconscious,” “cold,” “body heat” come through, along with Kurt’s soft “hmms” of understanding. 

“Well, we fixed all the urgent things in the house.” Kurt says, and the way his voice carries down the hallway Todd knows the blue mutant’s hoping he’ll overhear, “Everything now is mostly cosmetic, so we can pick those things up as time allows. Focusing on checking the house for drafts and making sure the heating is in order makes sense while we have a month or two before the first freeze. With the insulation, sealing off the attic will do a lot in terms of keeping in heat. The rest is less opening up the walls or anything like that and more laying stuff on them like tapestries or furs.”

Todd sighs, smooshing his face into the old quilt covering his bed. He can hear the expectation in the silence outside his door. He waits, several long minutes, and hears soft murmurs and shuffling, then the soft clink-thump of tiles being set as the others go back about their business.

He knows he’s being a little shit, even as Lance’s Mom behaviors annoy the hell out of him, the taller boy is right, winter poses a problem for Todd. The cold slows him down, leeching up every limb until he can hardly move, or stay awake. In the controlled heat of the ugly cinderblock they call a school, he can manage. But in the damp, swiss cheese that the Brotherhood house was up until a few months ago, he could stay alert maybe an hour before passing out. 

Their first winter together, he didn’t wake up one morning when the weather dropped to -1 at night and their radiator’d been on the fritz. Not that it bothered Todd, who’d slept through the whole thing. But he’d woken up smooshed in a pile with the other boys, all of them practically vibrating with worry as they rubbed his arms and legs. Freddy had cried. Todd’s pretty sure Lance and ‘Tro had too, but both of them hid their faces, opting to scold and complain at Todd instead.

If Todd is honest, he hates winter. The grey, dull slowness that bleeds into him the colder the weather becomes. Their work with the Morlocks had landed them some new clothes, including sturdier winter gear, and even thicker bedding. But it would be nice if the house stayed warm, if he didn’t feel like being awake was a fight for six whole months. 

Groaning, Todd flops over on his back, glaring briefly at the ceiling for the injustice of having nosy ass caring friends, before he lurches out of bed and back into the hallway. He finds the others still in the bathroom. Lance and Wanda working on laying the tiles, Kurt halfway out the bathroom window futzing with the frame so it closes smoother.

“We should probably insulate the fucking house so I don’t die.” He says.

Wanda looks up at him with her tiny unsmile. Lance just laughs, knocking the back of Todd’s knee with the grout trowel so he thumps onto his ass on the floor beside the older boy. Lance ruffles his hair, undoubtedly getting crap in it Todd will have to wash out later. 

“Was that so hard now?” He asks, laughing as Todd slaps his hand away. 

“I hate you,” Todd hisses, taking back the trowel Lance shoves into his chest.

Lance snorts, standing up and dusting off his hands, “Love you too, Toddles.” 

The three of them freeze a moment, still unused to that kind of declaration, even in play. It’d been happening more and more over the last few months, but every time it felt like the room skipped a beat, like they were all holding their breath as if any expression of affection might shatter whatever small peace they were carving out for themselves.

The moment passes and Lance clears his throat before address Kurt, who either didn’t notice the tension or blessedly chose to ignore it. 

“Blue, you said you had leads on this.” Lance says.

Kurt noodles his body back into the bathroom through the half open window that should not be able to accommodate his lean torso, yet does anyway. He slides the window up and down before nodding as if satisfied that it no longer screeches like a dying peacock before answering Lance. 

“Ja, they should be open today. You want to go now?” He asks.

Lance checks his watch before scrounging around in his pocket for his keys. “Yeah I got time.” 

Kurt teleports across the bathroom, reappearing in the hallway. Todd and Wanda both scrunch up their noses at the smell of blown out birthday candles with a hint of boiled eggs. 

“Unnecessary.” Wanda mutters, shooting Kurt a disapproving look.

Kurt shrugs apologetically, stuffing his hands in the pocket of his dusty hoodie. 

“I didn’t want to muck up the tiles you just set.” he says. 

Todd sends him a dry look, “Next time walk on the ceiling, it’s not like we can’t dust off your footprints.” 

Kurt rolls his eyes, or at least Todd thinks he does, before wandering out of sight after Lance. 

Todd thinks he hears the blue boy mutter, “Everyone is a critic.”   
Turns out, Kurt’s leads turn up a shitton of insulation materials that Todd hardly gets how to use, and a fuckton of rugs, quilts, and animal hides.

“I thought we were doing the entire attic, not just my room.” Todd says, tension building in his shoulders.

Lance leans in the doorway as Kurt and Kitty stare up at the ceiling, hands on their hips like a pair of grandpas surveying their begonias or some shit. Wanda, Tabby, Pietro and Freddy watch from where they’ve crowded on Todd’s bed. Most of the house has been outfitted with plush rugs, thick wall tapestries of varying tastefulness and fluffy sheep and cow skins, but Todd’s room is by far now the cushiest. With the added bonus that he got first dibs on everything. Which means his wall now sports an absolutely bizarre woven rendition of some painting by a dude named Bosch that looks like someone got halfway through a wet dream before it turned into a nightmare about band practice. His floors are almost completely covered in fluffy sheepskins, and Todd won’t admit it, but they feel fucking incredible. 

Blessedly, the radiator test revealed that old dead people knew how the fuck to build shit, because they still run solid as hell now that the boiler’s been replaced. And all the windows had been fixed earlier in the repairs. All they had left was insulating the attic.

“We are.” Kurt answers, “but since you’re the one who goes Rip Van Winkle in winter, it makes sense to start with your room, which is easier to find by going directly through. Katzchen?”

“You promise the attic isn’t full of ratkings?” Kitty asks, shuddering. 

Kurt shoots her a bland look. “You watch too much of those weird horror show things.” 

“Rat kings are a real thing, and I don’t want to phase through the desiccated corpses of a tangled rat colony.” She says. 

“That’s disgusting.” Todd says, shooting Lance a baffled look. 

Lance just shrugs from his perch in the doorway. Todd hears Pietro gag softly from his bed, and Wanda’s muted snicker.

Kurt sighs, kneeling on the floor before lacing his hands together, palms up on his raised knee.

“There are no rat kings in the attic. There’s not even a rat lord. We’ve already looked.” He says, looking up at Kitty with a smirk, “If I’m wrong, I’m coming right up after you anyway, so we’ll be in rat court together.” 

Kitty huffs and rolls her eyes, but steps into Kurt’s laced fingers anyway. 

“You’re terrible.” She says. 

“Mark.” Kurt replies, and Todd shoots Lance another confused look, receiving no clarity in return.

“Go!” Kitty chirps, and Kurt jumps, fucking launching the petite mutant into the ceiling.

“What. The fuck.” Todd says.

“Kitty was a gymnast, she’s good at these things.” Kurt replies, as if that explains anything about the recent rat exchange.

From the ceiling, a single cardigan clad arm pokes downward along with Kitty’s muffled voice calling for them to hurry up. Kurt laughs and then leaps up to the ceiling with a “coming liebling” before taking her offered hand and disappearing after her.

“That doesn’t bother you?” Todd asks, unsure what to make of the X-Geeks.

Lance shrugs, “Nah, I trust Kitty, and Blue is cool. Let them do their thing.” 

There’s a banging on the ceiling and they hear Kitty’s muffled voice.

“Will you all get up here, we haven’t got all day!” she calls. 

Turns out, that’s fine, because it takes them only half a day to insulate the attic between the eight of them. By the end of it, they’re all sweaty and starving and Todd can’t even imagine being cold enough to pass out ever again. They order pizza and sprawl out on the back porch in various states of undress, chewing in companionable silence as the sunset lights the sky on fire. Pietro is the one who makes the toast.

“To a warm bitch winter.” He says, raising his coke, before downing it. It’s actual soda, not diet, which means he’ll be vibrating into the next county within 10 minutes. 

The rest of the group echoes him, with laughter. Lance ruffles Todd’s hair with the arm not around Kitty, jostling him when he half-heartedly whines. Wanda’s non pizza hand rests on his knee, playing with the frayed edges of his jeans. He feels a tug on his ankle and looks down to see Kurt’s tail wrapped around his ankle, the blue mutant sprawled out, shirt rucked up in the grass. They catch each other’s eye and grin.


	7. Who Needs Sleep: Kurt & Pietro

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Clearly, I'm taking "the way to a man's heart is by making all his adopted family love you" approach to a romance, since 90% of these stories so far have like, no interaction between Todd and Kurt.
> 
> I also continue to write and share these oneshots in no cohesive order, and I'm not particularly sorry.
> 
> This episode featuring Insomnia and shit-talking Magneto. And snacks.

Idly, Kurt wonders if this is what will launch his breach into madness. Whatever Magneto’s bizarre experiments did won’t get a chance to come to fruition. The mockery of his alarm clock, red numbers winking cheekily at him “3:30 am” will do him in first.

He flops onto his bed from where he’s been pacing the last twenty minutes. It was a Tuesday and lights out at the mansion had been hours ago. In that time, well since 1:00 am when Logan had banged on his door and told him to stop reading and go to bed, Kurt had slowly veered away from decently relaxed to “Sleep will never know my name again.” 

He’d done his stretching routine for winding down from a performance. Tried Logan’s meditative breathing thing he’d made them all learn. Laid across every inch of his bed in every possible position. Hell, he’d even prayed, which despite everyone’s assumptions he barely did more than twice a month outside of quickly kissing up to God whenever the team managed not to die from whatever nonsense hit them that week, or he made it to class before the late bell. But sitting there, running his fingers over the prayer beads his mom had gotten him once he admitted the crucifix made him sad, contemplating the planet, the universe, and his place in everything did nothing to nudge his exhausted brain anywhere near actual sleep. Even his chemistry textbook, which might be the driest piece of literature in all existence, did nothing.

He bounces up off the bed, burying his face in his hands with a muffled groan. His room is starting to shrink around him, but he knows anywhere on the grounds the professor, or one of his teachers is likely to catch him, which feels just as stifling. Without his approval, his eyes roam over the empty bed Evan occupied before defecting to the Morlocks. Their room, his room, has been so quiet. Sometimes he looks at the overwhelmingly ordered, cream and red halls of the mansion and feels a pang of envy for Evan’s choice, mixed with a longing for brightly colored tents and painted train caravans packed with people laughing and constant talk, a longing for forests so old the trees whisper to you. 

He’s barely made the decision before he appears just outside the far wall of the mansion’s grounds, on the side that faces the woods. He may be running before he’s even finished porting, feet kicking off the wall and launching him into the trees. 

He runs without direction, leaping from tree to tree, hand over foot over tail. By the first mile, he feels the tension that’s wound its way around his spine over the last three hours loosen. By the second mile it vanishes, and he feels almost as free as when he’s practicing a trapeze routine at home. By the third mile, a content weariness wends its way through him and he slows, picking a wide branch of a massive gnarled oak tree to flop down on. 

Summer has not quite left Bayville, though it’s late-September, and the tree still has most of its leaves. The waxing moon peers down at Kurt through the gaps the wind blows through the branches. Kurt smiles up at her, lazily waving an arm through the air as if he could reach her glowing face, before letting it fall, hanging limp over the edge of the branch. His eyes slip shut, and sleep feels near, though he knows it’s a bad idea to let it take him, for a number of reasons. Not the least of which being his prior tree nap experiences have taught him it’s a great way to wake up with hair spiders, or an owl attack.

Still, he finds himself skirting the silvery edge of dreams when the distinct sound of someone ripping open a chip bag and eating with gusto reaches his ears. Kurt starts, shaking his head and blinking the fluff from his thoughts before glancing around. The snacking sounds, strangely enough, persist, though he’s very certain he’s awake. 

Curious, he quietly crawls his way up and around the tree trunk, to the far side of the oak, head pointing towards the ground to scope out what’s happening. When he catches the munching’s source he speaks before he thinks. 

“Pietro?” Kurt asks, half expecting that he is indeed dreaming, probably passed out on his bedroom floor.

The lanky, white haired mutant below yelps, rocketing the contents of a potato chip bag into the air, along with at least half a bag of twizzlers, and some trail mix. He whirls around, on his feet fast enough that Kurt catches only a blur of his white hair and green tracksuit. The boy points up at Kurt, brandishing a Twizzler at the blue mutant before catching himself. There’s more blurring and the Twizzler is gone, but Pietro is still pointing.

“You! Why are you here?” The speedster asks, voice muffled and cheeks bulging a bit. 

Because Kurt’s polite, and this encounter is strange enough as it is, he doesn’t comment on the Twizzler’s disappearance, or any potential connecting consequences. He hesitates a moment. Out of all the Brotherhood, Pietro still is the fussiest with him, occasionally tossing around comments about their supposed enemy status, or trying to use what Kurt assumes he thinks is a mature voice, but really just makes the boy sound like he’s got something stuck in his throat. Kurt mostly just answers this with sarcasm or polite, mildly mocking innocence. But rarely have he and the speedster ever been alone.

“I went for a run. Got tired. Landed here.” He says finally, shrugging.

“This is my midnight snack tree.” Pietro says.

“It’s like, four in the morning.” Kurt answers. 

“Midnight is relative. It’s a state of mind.” Pietro says, waving a half eaten snowball at him. 

“I don’t think that’s how time works.” Kurt says, crab walking just a step higher back up the tree. 

His mind wanders wondering if Pietro would give him a snowball if he asks, when Pietro’s next response catches him off guard. 

“You can’t have my tree!” He snaps, stomping his foot, in a gesture he probably didn’t mean to make. 

Kurt probably shouldn’t ask for a snowball.

“Okay.” He says, aware of the way his voice cracks upward with a mixture of confusion and strain from not laughing. This feels like a do not laugh scenario.

Wary, but not wanting to further whatever tree related offense he has caused, Kurt hops down from the tree. He somersaults to land next to Pietro, as far from the tree as he can get without landing out of the boy’s sight.

“You, you worm your way in everywhere!” Pietro shouts, clearly not done, he paces, blurring a bit and the snowball in his hand vanishes. “You’re already at school! Now my house! My friends! Cracking jokes! Yelling at my nightmare boss! Rearranging things! Bringing Morlocks! Now here! At my Tree!” 

The boy's words come rapid fire and it takes Kurt a minute to space them all out from the car crash pile up they make in his brain. Once he does, his chest knots up, the peace he’d found from his run disappearing. He tips his face to the ground, hoping his hair and the dark of the night will hide his expression. Without noticing, he’d come to think of Pietro as a friend. A picky, fussy one, but so was Scott, and Kurt liked him all the same. The fact that it was not mutual stung more than he’d expected.

“Ah. I am sorry to be such a nuisance.” Kurt says, tearing his eyes up from the patch of moss he’s been studying to avoid looking at the speedster next to him. “I will not bother your tree.” 

This apparently is the wrong answer, because Pietro huffs, flopping a bit like a collapsing pool floaty before jumping back up straight.

“Ugh, that’s not it.” He says, darting forward to grab Kurt by the arm.

He drags the blue mutant back over to the scattered snack circle under the tree, tugging him down to sit beside him. Kurt throws a wary, confused glance Pietro’s way. 

“This is mixed messages.” He says. He’d heard Kitty say that before, and hopes he’s remembering the context right. 

Pietro shoves the half empty bag of chips his way, rolling his eyes as if Kurt’s the tackiest thing he’s ever seen.

“You’re not a nuisance.” He says, spitting the words out like they’re bitter, “You’re just new. It feels like everything is and it’s hard.”

When he looks back at Kurt, his eyes are wet. The blue mutant startles, but squishes his urge to reach out, to hug. He may not be a nuisance, but he doesn’t think he’s in the hug zone yet.

“He’s supposed to help us. To help me.” Pietro says, idly smooshing one of the fallen chips into the leaf little with his heel. “So why is it you, not him?”

He laughs, voice wet, “Hell, why is a terrifying knife lady with an eyepatch the first adult who said something that wasn’t ‘do better’ or ‘get out of my face’ to me in the last 6 months?”

“I’m uhm, I’m adopted.” Kurt says, and Pietro stops rubbing his eyes to look at him, “My birth mom”--dropped him off a bridge-- “left me. But my parents. My family at the circus. They found me and they kept me. They keep me.” 

Pietro gives him a blank look, hands still woven in his white hair. Kurt figures he better draw his conclusion before the speedy mutant pulls it all out. 

“Sometimes, blood is not who loves us. Sometimes family comes in other places.” He says. “It does not mean we were bad. It does not always mean they were bad. But we can still be loved. Be kept.” 

Pietro covers his face with a wet cough, shifting so Kurt can’t see him. Kurt turns his head away, pretending to study a nearby mushroom, he stretches his leg out a bit, bumping the other teen’s knee with his. 

“But your dad is kind of an arschloch though.” He adds, voice soft, and Pietro breaks into shaky laughter. 

“Yeah, yeah he kinda is.” Pietro says, turning to look at him.

His eyes are red, but they’re dry when he smiles, bumping Kurt’s knee with his own. They fall into a companionable silence for several minutes, the woods breathing around them. Kurt looks thoughtfully down at the chip bag before glancing at the remaining snowball. 

“Can I have that?” He asks, pointing to the pink, flaky abomination with his tail. 

Pietro snatches it up, holding it in his fingertips like a baseball, “If you can take it!” 

The pair lock eyes for a second. Pietro’s eyes flicker, just slow enough that Kurt notices him watching his hands and tail. The blue teen lunges face first mouth wide. He shoves the chip bag into Pietro’s face and the boy flails backward shrieking. Kurt shoves his mouth on the snowball in Pietro’s hand. The other teen reflexively let’s go and Kurt scrambles backwards, prize hanging half out of his mouth. Pietro stares at him, as if he can’t decide whether the other mutant is a genius or mad. Laughter bubbles from Kurt’s mouth around the snowball and Kurt coughs to keep from choking. His face is covered in flecks of pink coconut. In this moment, he recalls that coconut tastes like sunblock, which is to say, terrible. Pietro breaks into hysterical laughter watching him swallow the snack in two exaggerated, sloppy bites. He hate’s coconut, but it’s delicious. 

The two part soon after that, Pietro zipping away towards home and Kurt doing the same. They split the empty snack wrappers between them. Kurt absently shoves his in his too full wastebin when he teleports back inside the manor. He bellyflops onto his bed, dragging his pillow down to his head where he sprawls catty corner, one leg mostly off the mattress. 

He sleeps well the rest of that night.


	8. Butterfingers: No one let Mystique hold the baby

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay, this bit's gotten so long, I'm actually linking these moments through multiple sequential chapters. We hit linear storytelling by accident, y'all. 
> 
> Content Warnings: The next few chapters have a lot of angst in them, since they're focusing on Kurt's birth, Mystique's questionable parenting, her terrorizing the Brotherhood, and Magneto's experimentation. I try to avoid going into gory details, but the implications are there. Also, this marks the introduction of a fuckton of OC's as I fill in Kurt's backstory by taking scraps of canon and drowning them in a fuckton of headcanons.

First off, Todd is going to die from the effort of not laughing every time one of Kurt’s circus friends calls Mystique “Butterfingers.” His life, alas, is very close to the end, because this is the only way the circus kids refer to her. 

It began when the Brotherhood and remaining X-Geeks arrived at Captain Britain/Excalibur’s base three days ago. The first time it happened, the blue woman bristled, the scales on her skin lengthening into spines in the way that never failed to have any of the Brotherhood, save Wanda or Boom Boom cringing back into line faster than their balls could crawl back into their body. 

Todd had shot an alarmed look to Lance, who looked equally frazzled, reflexively throwing an arm in front of Freddy. This habit was hilarious given Freddy was the tallest and broadest of the Brotherhood, but he was also the baby at 17, and there was a Responsibility to shield him from the Wrath of the Boss. Freddy for his part was wringing the hem of his faded hoodie between his hands. Pietro vibrated in and out of existence seemingly in the kitchen doorway.

But the Brotherhood’s tension went unnoticed by the circus kids who were hanging out with them in the kitchen, Stephan, who Kurt seemed especially close to, which was hard to tell given he seemed to have a near psychic bond with all the circus teens, was the one who let the name drop. The youth continued doing the dishes, passing them to Kurt to dry as if he was not about to be obliterated off the face of the planet. Indeed, all of the circus kids continued about their business as if death was not in their midst. The only indication that anything was amiss was the furball’s breathy snort as he swatted his friend with a dishtowel. 

“Stephy” He said. 

“What. Did you call me.” Mystique asked, her voice dropping in a way that made it very much not a question. 

“Butterfingers?” Stephy replied, “What else do you call someone who drops a baby off a fucking bridge?” 

A question that Todd would only revisit later, as in the moment he was too terrified of Mystique’s wrath to fully grasp the sheer amount of heavy lifting that string of words was doing.

The other circus members, who’ve made a habit of continuously dropping in and out of Captain Britain’s headquarters despite his grousing about “secrecy” seem to take that as an answerable question, sounding off around the room. 

“Blokime” Vince, a sturdy acrobat who’s frohawk is dyed in rainbow colors offered from where one of the other circus kids, Lila, a water performer with dark eyes and red-orange scales on her face and hands was fastidiously gluing little rhinestones onto his nails.

“Mizhak” Angelis, the youngest strongman, who Sven mentors answered, without looking up from painting Wanda’s nails.

“Dummbatz” Jimaine, the round faced ballerina with a mess of blonde curls said.

“Khota” Prityi, a short dancer and fire artist whose hair trails past her thick waist answered, without looking up from her magazine

“Gae-sae” Ehra, a lanky contortionist with buzzed black hair said around a mouthful of cake from a slice she’s sharing with Tabby.

“Arschkeks, verfluchter!” Neil, one of the younger adult aerialists, who is in fact American, not German shouted from the other room.

Fast forward to day three of the Brotherhood crashing with the X-team in Captain Britain’s bizarre lighthouse base and Todd’s pretty sure he’s heard the adults get in on “Mystique’s name is now Butterfingers.” 

When one of the teens mentions butterfingers, the adults automatically reply as if they’ve said Mystique’s name. Mystique’s initial homicidal rage at this behavior has faded into churlish indignation as literally no one outside of the Brotherhood boys cringes away from her smoldering. And after three days of no bloody destruction, the Brotherhood boys find the urge to flinch less compelling.

Finally, at about one in the afternoon after Mystique storms out of the living area covered in idle teenagers who were too old for high school, but too preoccupied battling genocidal robots and one egomaniacal ancient blue guy to try community college, Freddy asks the question Todd’s been wondering. 

“Uhm. What did you mean the other day? About the baby thing.” he asks, looking over to where Stephan and Kurt are reading stacked on top of each other in an X in the middle of the floor. 

Stephan glances at Kurt, smacking him in the shoulder. “They don’t know?” 

“Huh?” Kurt replies, looking up from his book. 

“They don’t know about Butterfingers?” Prityi asks, glancing over to the pair from where she, Vin and Kitty are braiding one another’s hair. 

Evan rolls his eyes, “We know she’s his mom and it’s supposed to be a super secret, but I mean come on.” 

“They know she birthed me.” Kurt says, the phrasing a quiet objection.

Lila leans over from her place on the couch to swat him on the ass with her magazine, “But do they know why she’s butterfingers?” 

Jimaine twists to stare at Kurt from the armchair she and Ehra are sharing. Kurt shifts his face, weaving to avoid her look as she weaves to try and catch him.

“Oh my goddess. You didn’t tell them, did you?” She asks. 

“He told me.” Rogue says quietly, from where she and Wanda are doing a tarot reading with Lila at the coffee table.

Cyclops shifts, turning the frown he’s had fixed on the chess game he’s been losing to Angelis to the rest of the room.

“What is it?” He asks, then hesitates, “I mean, you don’t have to tell us if you don’t want to.” 

Then everyone starts talking at once.

Pietro groans from his spot on the couch opposite Lila, “You’re gonna have all this buildup and do your touchy feely “you don’t have to do what’s not comfortable” X-Geek crap with us?” 

“Hey, the Mystique thing is a lot! He doesn’t say much about it.” Evan says. 

“What exactly is a butterfingers?” Piotr murmurs, abandoning his arm wrestling contest with Freddy.

“I didn’t mean to start anything.” Freddy says quietly at the same time pulling his hand away from Piotr’s as he looks down into his lap.

“Pietro don’t be a dick.” Lance starts.

“Does it actually matter why butterfingers?” Jean asks.

Everyone’s comments stack on top of eachother, going on and on back and forth about whose business it was and whether they should even ask, or why the nickname. Todd eyes the large open door frame at the edge of the room, considering if he can make the leap out of the rising cacophony of a dozen and a half arguing teenagers when Kurt’s voice rings out over them all. 

“She dropped me off a verdammt bridge!” Kurt shouts, rolling over underneath Stephan to flop dramatically onto his back.

All sound whooshes out of the room. Several of the circus kids huff, as if satisfied with this. Meanwhile, the X-Geeks and Brotherhood are all shooting varyingly frantic, confused, or disturbed glances back and forth with each other.

“You, you wanna repeat that, fuzz?” Todd asks.

Kurt drops his book on face, groaning. “She dropped me off a bridge when I was a baby.”

Todd’s skin feels too tight, like it might peel off. Freddy looks at Todd with the wide sad eyes he gets with the crying kitten commercials. Lance swears quietly to himself. Everything in the room rattles with red energy, just a little, before Wanda hisses and it stops. The furniture, which abruptly levitated a couple inches off the ground when Kurt said it the first time, clunks back down with a muttered sorry from Jean. Everyone on said furniture relaxes their grip. Evan grumbles over his shirt, now shredded from his bone armor. Scott is silent, jaw working, one hand drifting up to his glasses without his notice. Piotr looks over at Kurt across the room, chiseled face set in a quiet, knowing look. Tabby shoves her hand in a nearby vase, and steam pours out as the flowers wilt. The circus kids glance at the other teens with grim expressions. 

On the floor, Stephan has scooted more on top of Kurt, creating a sort of gravity hug situation. The blue mutant’s tail absently thumps against one lean brown calf as Stephan gently tugs on the indigo curls poking out from the book’s cover. Whether it’s a gesture of pestering or comfort Todd can’t tell.

“That’s what I thought you said.” Todd says, before jumping over to the staircase.

Behind him he hears Forge’s quiet, “That’s a lot to unpack,” from where the two of them had been dismantling an old radio in the corner.

He shouts upstairs where Mystique presumably still is, “Yo boss, how the fuck did you drop a baby? I’ve seen you fly, you didn’t try and go catch him?”

Behind him, he hears a few startled, semi-hysterical laughs. He thinks he hears a bark of laughter from Kurt, but calling it that feels like a stretch.

Mystique, of course, doesn’t bother to say anything, if she’s even there. The other adults are all out, doing whatever international hero business they have at the moment. Todd ambles back into the living room, unsure what he even expected.

“Why was she on a bridge in Germany?” Pietro asks, hands pressed together against his lips as he stares into space like the answers might materialize.

“Because I was your father’s lab rat.” Kurt says, his voice muffled from under his book.

“I’m sorry--What?” Lance and Scott say at the same time before turning to each other, both looking like they’d stepped into a puddle with socks on. The floor under them rumbles a little, and Lance looks down, embarrassed. Scott reaches out, giving the other boy’s should a couple awkward thumps.

Wanda turns in her seat, eyes glancing over Kurt before landing on Pietro. She’s been talking more, her face more open in the last few months. Now it’s drawn, olive skin blanching in a way that makes her black lipstick harsh. Pietro’s dropped his hands into his lap, Todd can’t see his face from this angle, but the line of his shoulders is wire tight. 

On the floor, Kurt sighs, sliding the book off his face and sitting up, casually wrapping his arms around Stephan in the process. The other boy sits up with him, so he’s lounging in the blue mutant’s lap, and their easy posture implies this is a regular thing for them. Kurt runs a hand over his face, ruffling a hand through his now shorter mop of curls, sliding it back to rub the close cropped bits of his undercut. He glances back and forth from Wanda to Pietro.

“I’m sorry. I said that harshly.” He says, “I have proof. Tapes. But you do not have to believe me.” 

Wanda and Pietro share another look. Todd vaguely remembers them mentioning a psychic connection once, and wonders how strong that is. 

“We believe you.” Pietro answers, looking at Kurt a long moment before his eyes slip back to Wanda, “We know how he can be.” 

Prityi’s voice breaks the tight, heavy silence in the room, “Tapes? You said you found documents, but not tapes.” 

Kurt hunches in on himself, but Stephan’s presence in his lap keeps him from hiding fully. 

“I might have. Confronted Magneto.” He mutters. “And made him give me his files on me.”

Rogue’s shout of “What” almost drowns out Stephan’s comment.

Stephan looks at him unimpressed, “I told you, you’d go and get found out. And look at you, you give yourself away.” 

Prityi rounds on him next, extracting herself from the braiding loop, “You knew!” she accuses, hovering over the pair like a highly fashionable hawk.

Stephan scrunches back, attempting to shield himself in Kurt’s arms. “Blood brother secrecy! We pinky swore!” 

Prityi and the other circus kids groan. 

“You two did that when you were nine!” Vin shouts.

“Blood brother secrecy is for sneaking boys in your room. Not hiding running directly towards the creepy old man who did unspeakable things to you as a baby!” Ehra says. 

“We still haven’t decided if Kurt’s last fingers count as pinkies!” Lila says. 

Kurt shrugs, “They’re my littlest finger. Just because I only have three doesn’t mean it’s not a pinky.”

“What does that make your other two fingers?” Freddy asks, expression melting out of horror from the recent revelations and into curiosity. 

“Pointer and thumb.” Kurt says, holding up a hand. 

“Anyway.” Rogue starts, standing up from the coffee table to join Prityi in hovering over Kurt and Stephan. “What are the tapes?” 

“You did mention getting them, but didn’t say what was on them.” Stephan says, also turning expectantly to Kurt.

The blue mutant winces, looking away and running a hand nervously through his hair once more. The curls are beginning to frizz from the attention. 

“They are, not pleasant.” He says, “I have not finished them. It was hard to stomach alone.” 

Rogue, who has a better read on Kurt than Todd considered, straightens with understanding. 

“You have them. I mean they’re here, aren’t they?” Rogue asks. 

Kurt winces, shakes his head, looks up then nods with a shrug, lips twisting into a grim parody of a smile. 

“Do you even need to go through them?” Kitty asks. “Like, what’s the point of knowing that creeps’ thoughts?” 

Several murmurs of agreement drift up around the room. Kurt shakes his head, sighing like he hasn’t slept in a hundred years.

“Magneto. What he did to me, may have consequences. I am hoping his files have answers.” Kurt says. 

“If we go to the professor maybe…” Scott starts, but Kurt shoots him a look, “Not this again, I know you have concerns but--”

Kurt holds up a hand, “I do not fully trust anyone who emblazons his entire house with his initials, and lets a bunch of high schoolers fly a plane and punch mercenaries in the face. As much fun as I have had from his questionable judgment.”

Jean cuts off further argument with a clap of her hands. 

“Right, so when are we watching the ramblings of a baby experimenter with a god complex?” she asks, and everyone swivels to look at her. 

“I-they are, not going to be pleasant. I’m sure.” Kurt says. “I don’t know what’s in them. If it will change what you all think of me.” 

Tabby slips off the armchair she’s been sprawled in to crawl over to Kurt. Stephan has shifted to wrap his arms around the blue mutant, so she wraps her arms around the both of them.

“I love you. I don’t think you’re perfect. You’re kinda judgy and impulsive. And you’re shit at telling people you love anything you think might even faintly inconvenience them, or asking for help. But you’re funny, and kind.” Kurt’s face is hidden by the two teens surrounding him, but Todd sees his shoulders hitch in what might be a sob, “And determined, and think of all kinds of clever weird shit that usually saves our asses. You see good in people, not just potential good, but like right now good. You know how to dance and sing, but do it badly to make people laugh.”

Tabby pulls back, wiping at the wet streaks in Kurt’s face fur. “You are so so much, in all the ways that make me happy you put up with me. And whatever weird shit buckethead has on you isn’t gonna change that.” 

Stephan makes a show of wiping his face on Kurt’s shirt, and the room breaks into wet laughter.

Kurt drags Tabby back to him, pressing a kiss to her forehead, “I don’t put up with you, liebling. You are a gift.” 

Tabby thumps his back, but doesn’t protest otherwise. 

“I love you having more friends, it means we only repeat ourselves half as much now.” Jimaine says from her perch with Ehra.

“We don’t all have to see what the file has. But you shouldn’t do it by yourself.” Kitty says. 

Kurt gives her a watery smile, “No, I think it may be useful. Magneto is our ally with Apocalypse and the sentinels looming, but who knows tomorrow? But, I don’t want the adults to see, if we can.”

Which is how all of them end up crammed in the largest bedroom with the door shut and the window cracked so they don’t all die of heatstroke. They’ve gathered every laptop between them in order to maximize viewing.

Kurt presents them with a thick binder, mostly full of the previously mentioned documents, but in the back is a page slotted with four CDs. 

“Well, into hell we go.” He mutters as they pop open all four laptop’s disc drives, pulling the first four disks out.


	9. The Tapes Part 1: Four Mutants and a Baby

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It is potentially cruel of me to give what is arguably a very angst drama chapter a comedic title, but I live to amuse myself. 
> 
> CW: Violence in summary, allusions to experimentation on a baby, body horror birthing, more of me Frankensteining various canons together. 
> 
> I like the idea of X-Men: Days of Future Past verse Azazel who isn't literally satan but instead some kind of absurd hitman.
> 
> Also, mass info-dumping in this and the next chapter, I realized writing all the contents of the video in real-time would be like describing the characters sitting and watching Lord of the Rings in terms of pacing, and opted to summarize the teens' key takeaways instead.

Turns out the tapes are awful. And bizarre. And hilarious, in a horrifyingly creepy way. 

Only the first two discs are footage and notes from Kurt’s babyhood. The videos are staticky and popping in the way that old camcorder footage usually is. 

From them they learn:

  * Kurt’s bio dad is some red dude named Azazel, who was dating some dude with tornado hands who calls himself Riptide because he apparently didn’t consider how hilarious tornado hands sounded.
  * Kurt apparently knew this, because he met them a couple of years ago by accident. And turns out even if the face is blue, if it has an uncanny resemblance to yours, you’re gonna ask questions. Now Kurt says they’re like his weird, criminal uncles, popping up randomly to “train him” or offer life advice. They insist they’re no longer together, but Kurt insists their bickering says they are.
  * Azazel and Riptide apparently made some bizarre “let’s platonic co-parent the ultimate gay mutant baby” deal with Mystique, Magneto, and Mystique’s maybe wife Destiny--who it turns out Rogue knew about because the two raised her.
  * Mystique had cravings for fried avocado the entire span of her pregnancy, which is near impossible to come by in the middle of nowhere Germany
  * Magneto never intended to let the others keep Kurt, but planned to take him and raise him to be Captain Genosha
  * Kurt is also literally an entire year younger than everyone thought, though he insists this no longer counts because of the months he’s spent hopping through other dimensions. Which, sure. 
  * Mystique apparently gave birth to Kurt, not the expected way, but instead by literally opening her body to pull him out of her, which, cool, but horrifying. 
  * Kurt’s name apparently was Kaven before his parents found him, which Azazel continuously wove into ridiculous songs while rocking him, to Mystique and Riptide’s annoyance
  * Kurt is uncircumcised, which was an entire argument between the four adults upon his birth. Kurt hides his face in his hands until this clip ends.
  * But Mystique apparently sang lullabies to him when she thought no one was around, and held the phone to his ear when calling Destiny and toddler Rogue
  * Riptide made a game out of tossing Kurt up into the air and hovering him with his powers. Mystique and Azazel did not like this, but Kurt found it hysterical
  * Toddler Wanda and Pietro met baby Kurt. Pietro tried to eat Kurt’s tail, while Wanda kept trying to get him to stand, and huffed when he would fall over. The twins go still and quiet when their mother, Magda, appears on screen playing with the three children. 
  * Kurt had baby teeth after like, a month. Mystique did not enjoy this.
  * Magneto’s experiments were apparently early prototypes of the mutation perfection machine thing he tried to use on Scott and Alex. An offhand comment implies he was drugging the other adults at night to avoid interruptions before taking baby Kurt from his crib 
  * Kurt’s x gene apparently resisted Magneto’s efforts, reverting back to itself no matter what the man did. Magneto mentions something about mutation instability in later life given Kurt’s advanced mutation. Baby Kurt screams a lot in these videos. The teens take a lot of breaks in watching them.
  * Azazel and Riptide are called away on business. Both of them kiss baby Kurt goodbye and promise to be back in a week.
  * Magneto mentions plans to kidnap Kurt while the other two men are gone, saying something about pushing harder with his genome project, and subduing Mystique if he can’t avoid her. 
  * Magda is the one who warns Mystique not to trust Magneto, insisting she suspects something strange and has been afraid to leave the twins with them. Mystique blows off her invitation to flee together. Magda leaves that night.
  * Magneto steps away to get supplies when Mystique breaks into Magneto’s lab and snatches Kurt out of the weird glass incubator. He catches her before she can leave and she kicks him in the face before running, baby Kurt tucked to her chest.
  * Two days later, when Magneto is ransacking his own laboratory, Azazel and Riptide blast through one of the walls. The pair proceed to beat the shit out of Magneto, uncaring how much metal equipment he throws at them. Mystique seems to be gone completely. 



Despite loading up all four laptops with discs, they don’t get past the first two that night. There’s too much. They’re all quiet the rest of the night, huddling together in clumps in the living room after dinner. The adults--though Todd guesses they’re technically all adults now too, save Freddy and Lila who are a few months from 18--all shoot each other concerned confused looks, but don’t pry. As the evening tapers away into the deeper parts of the night, Kurt murmurs something to Angelis and Vin that Todd doesn’t catch before noodling his way out of the circus/Excalibur pile he’s in the middle of and slipping away up the stairs. 

The others who notice are waved off by Kurt before they can speak. After a few minutes of watching the door where the blue youth made his exit, they all turn back to whatever they’re in the middle of. Todd waits what feels like an eternity, but is probably like 10 minutes before mumbling some excuse to Forge--who looks like he knows it’s bullshit but doesn’t care--before following the blue mutant. He untangles his legs from the pile the Brotherhood make around Wanda and Pietro, nudging each of the twins on his way to standing. He steps over Rogue, Evan and Kitty, who form a bridge between the Excalibur/Circus pile and the Brotherhood one. The rest of the room is littered with X-Geeks who seem to be splitting their attention between whatever their supposed evening entertainment is and doing sweeps of the group with their eyes. No one’s drink has been empty all night, and Todd still can’t figure out how Major Laser is refilling them without getting caught. 

When Todd steps through the doorway he realizes with a start that one of the others, Jean or Wanda he can’t tell, has set some kind of barrier between the room and the rest of the house. While no one’s loud in the room behind him, there’s not a sound carrying from there into the hallway. No rustling pages, shuffling limbs, breathing. There may as well be a wall behind him. His lips twitch up in a smile, this might explain why there’s no adults hovering in nearby rooms attempting to eavesdrop. 

Todd skulks through the unlit upstairs hallways, past the half closed doors of the teachers and older heroes rooms that cast thin strips of watery light on the wellkept, worn hall carpet. His search brings him all the way to the roof of the lighthouse. At first he doesn’t think the furball is there, the little sliver of a moon tucked behind a dense layer of fog this entire boggy country seems to be covered in. He strolls a circle over the sloping, circle of the roof, getting almost all the way around from the open window he’d found before he catches sight of Kurt’s shadowy outline sprawling across the tiles. 

He drops down beside the blue mutant, whose glowing eyes don’t seem to tip his way. Instead his gaze stays trained on the sky above as if he can see through the cloud cover to the stars beyond. As if they might have answers. Todd spreads out beside the other mutant, close enough their arms press together from shoulder to elbow, raised above their heads. He stares out at the stars for a moment before losing interest, eyes inevitably drifting over to the mutant beside him.

Close up, he can see what few details the shadows of night don’t swallow. Kurt’s hair is frizzed, undoubtedly from the repeated rufflings he’s given it over the course of their viewing. The curve of his mouth is a tight, unhappy line, his jaw tight. His eyes are half-lidded. He looks wrung out, wrinkled shirt collar bunched up at his chin. The shirt’s a splotchy mix of electric fuschia, baby pink and lavender, overlaid with black leopard spots. Earlier in the day, the look had felt perfectly Kurt in that “90’s electro-club” tacky way, now the cheerfulness of the print feels nearly absurd against the horrors of the evening.

The glow in Kurt’s eyes shifts its focus from the stars to Todd’s face. 

“I can see you, you know.” He says. “Your eyes glow too, a little.” 

Todd feels his face heat, and from the way one corner of Kurt’s mouth twitches up in an almost smirk, he’s sure the other mutant can see him blush. 

“Your face.” He says, because he doesn’t have any comeback.

“Is a work of art, I know.” Kurt says, grinning without cheer before sobering, “Why are you here?” 

Todd shrugs, “It’s a free roof.” 

Kurt’s face twists wryly, “Actually it’s apparently quite expensive, Captain Britain keeps complaining about it.”

“That is the most old man shit I have ever heard.” Todd replies.

“Tell me about it.” Kurt says. 

He suddenly twists, turning on his side to look at Todd, head propped up on one hand in a way that kinda makes him look like one of those old magazine pinups. An observation Todd files away in the increasingly thick file he keeps in the basement of his mind marked “Do not look closely.” 

“Don’t start treating me like glass too.” Kurt says.

Todd blinks, taking that in. “Who’s treating you like glass?”

“Everyone!” Kurt snaps, sitting up so fast Todd half expects him to roll off the roof. “All night, you tiptoe around me. Every hand touches me as if I might break. I almost rather those who are too disgusted to even come close.”

“Are you fucking serious.” Todd says, and he’s shoving himself into Kurt’s space before he even realizes he’s moving.

“You make everyone else around you care about each other!” He says, pushing Kurt in the shoulder. A sour frown creases the blue mutant’s face and he shoves back, but Todd doesn’t stop, punctuating every sentence with a push. “You nudge us all to talk about our feelings! You introduce people! You show up when we try to run off on our own! You talk all the time about love and connection as strength, as real power, but what do you do? When things are hard, when someone holds out their hand?” Todd says only dimly aware of the way his voice rises over the course of his rant, by the end of it, they have their fists tangled in each other’s shirts, faces close enough that he’s pretty sure he’s getting spit in the other boy’s fur. “So why, when we care for you, is it suddenly pity? Why is needing help weak when it’s you needing?”

Kurt suddenly collapses, all the resistance he held against Todd’s grappling crumbling. 

“Because people have given too much for me to even get here as it is!” He wails, voice breaking into a sob, “I cannot ask for any more.” 

Todd’s breath catches like the blue youth had punched him in the gut. The roof seems to ring with Kurt’s words as they sink onto the clay tiles. Without consciously thinking about it, Todd pulls the other teen and Kurt falls against him without resistance. He shakes against Todd’s chest, and the amphibious mutant feels a damp patch growing on his neck and shirt collar. He wraps his arms around the blue mutant’s back, rocking them. He presses his face into dark indigo curls.

“Didn’t you say once care is a renewable resource? The more we care for others the more they can care too?” Todd asks, voice rough to his own ears. Kurt makes a pained hitching whine in his throat, but Todd presses on. “Let us restock your care.” 

Kurt cries, almost silent save for the occasional wet hiccup or gasp. Todd holds him, shifting so the two are sitting instead of kneeling. Absently he realizes Lance will fuss at him for being barefoot on the roof in October. His toes are cold, but Kurt pressed up against him is like a living fire, so he figures he’s fine. He doesn’t know long they stay like that, but eventually Kurt pulls back, rubbing at his face before looking at Todd.

“Okay.” He says. “Okay. Danke, Todd.” 

Todd pulls a face, but doesn’t put any heart in it. “Don’t thank me, weirdo.” 

Kurt huffs what’s almost a laugh.

When they slip back into the weird lightbulb room at the top of the lighthouse, Todd is startled to see Kitty and Stephan sitting at the top of the lighthouse stairs, playing cards with Rogue and Prityi who’re seated a few steps down. Kurt shows no shock, but sighs as if he’s been asked to take out the trash in the rain.

“I told you.” Stephan says, and Rogue grunts, shoving a handful of mini candy bars into the boy’s lap. 

“Jimaine’s right, this is so much easier now that you have American friends to yell at you too.” Prityi adds, putting down a card before, holding up her empty hands and making grabby hands towards the others, “Out.” 

The others all groan and toss their remaining cards into Prityi’s lap with varying force. 

Kurt’s face clouds over again, lips parting with what Todd is sure will be a very unconvincing argument about how he does not have a martyr complex actually, but is a bad little worm who doesn’t deserve nice things. Thankfully Stephan cuts him off before he gets out a word.    
  
“Oh!” He cries, tossing his hands up to his face, “Woe is me! I look like a model from outer space, but no one can see how truly monstrous I am.” Stephan flops backward, throwing himself to the floor as he tosses his arms above his head, face twisted in an anguish so exaggerated it’s comical, “I am somehow the only one on this earth too vile of heart to take any hand extended in help. I am Dorian Grey, the rotting portrait in the attic. Everyone else may be forgiven, but my sins, of tracking dirt on the ceiling and once talking back to my father about mucking the barn out are too great. Every lover I ever held has been ensorcelled by my deceit. I bring shame upon my family, my friends. I banish myself. It is the only way. Oh!” 

Stephan arches his back at the end of his monologue, sweeping his arms in a wide arc across the floor before appearing to faint, one hand draped across his forehead. Prityi and Kitty break into applause. Rogue has collapsed against the wall of the stairwell, her shoulders shaking as tiny gasps of silent laughter escape her. Todd lost his shit when Stephan reached the Dorian Grey point of his performance, and ended up one knee on the floor, hands on his stomach as he gasps for breath. Only Kurt appears unmoved, but his lips are again fighting a smile as he stands, one arm across his chest, the other hand rubbing his forehead as he glares down at Stephan who stares up at him with an expression of the deepest anguish. Or food poisoning.

“Don’t do that, no one sweeps up here.” Kurt says, and Stephan frowns, examining the hand he’d draped over his face with faint horror. “Also I hate you.”

“I’m seeing that. Ugh.” He says, sitting up and dusting himself off. “I love you too, bastard.”

The group makes their way down the stairs, finding the rest of the teens have made themselves into a human breadcrumb trail leading back to the living room. They run into Scott and Evan midway through the stairwell, Vin, Forge and Angelis at the foot with Lance, prodding around the crown molding and carpet like they’re looking for a project. Tabby and Jimaine are in the hallway, having dragged a checkerboard up with them, Wanda and Pietro are with them, apparently each running sabotage for one of the two girls. Jean, Ehra, Freddy and Lila wait at the bottom of the second stairwell, Ehra and Jean engage in a complicated game of Cat’s Cradle while the other two watch.

Two nights later, when the group sits down to watch the other two tapes, the others pointedly crowd Kurt, sitting close enough that he’s bumping knees and elbows whenever he moves. The blue mutant huffs as if annoyed, but a smile tremors on the edges of his lips. 

“Okay,” he says, “Let’s see what’s left.” 

And they hit play on the third disc.


	10. The Tapes Part 2: Magneto's Creepy As Shit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Whew, okay, this chapter was a beast. I may come back and do some edits on this since I know it's a bit rough and dirty, but for now, I kinda want to ship it out into the world. I also choose a really unconventional format here, so hopefully it's somewhat legible.
> 
> The content is a little heavier for this chapter, so content warnings for: 
> 
> Mentions of child trafficking, endangerment, emotional/physical/psychological abuse and abandonment  
> Mention of freakshows and exploitation therein  
> descriptions of fistfights  
> blood  
> knife fights  
> someone wrongly guessing a person's sexuality  
> implications of teenage sex (in public places)  
> grief around the death of a child  
> smoking  
> people punching each other  
> references to adults preying on teens  
> references to the holocaust and genocide  
> invasion of privacy like whoa on Magneto's part  
> people being recorded without their knowledge doing a wide variety of things, including fucking  
> Intense emotional feelings around abandonment

The second set of discs are less horrifying in several ways, but more disturbing for the implications they give.

Each clip on the third disc is accompanied by voiceover notes from Magneto. His comments are clinical and his voice sounds distant, as if he’s studying nature footage, which adds to the creepy factor. About halfway through the discs, the teens start adding in their own commentary, also in Nature documentary voices. Everyone works to one up each other’s absurdity in terms of commentary.

From them they learn, and comment:

  * That sometime in their sophomore year of school, Magneto recognized Kurt and apparently decided to track him back to Europe.
  * This effort involved apparently, going to see a circus performance with a camera hidden in his jacket pocket. This leads to some accidentally hilarious but also horrifying footage when he attempts to study Kurt up close during the halftime entertainment, where several performers amuse the crowds from small platforms scattered around the concession area. From the camera’s placement, Magneto stands close enough to Kurt’s platform that he could reach out and touch the then 16-year-old mutant. He peppers the blue teen with questions about where he’s traveled, his age, how long he’s been performing. About midway through the clip, two teenage girls can be seen whispering to each other from where they’ve been watching Kurt perform across from Magneto. One girl disappears returning a few minutes later with what appears to be her dad. Not a moment after that, Kurt’s mother drops down to the platform from above, blocking Magneto’s view. Her voice sounds like a knife as she asks the man if she can help him. Magneto retreats after that, confining the rest of his observations to his seat in the high seats at the back of the tent. 
    *       * “The Nightcrawler’s bright coloring aids him in attracting mates, but leaves him vulnerable to predators.” Evan drones, dropping his voice into what he insists are ‘late night DJ’ tones, “To increase his risk of survival, he lives in troupes with other performers.”  
“The mother acrobat, sensing a threat to her young, gives a warning call, puffing herself up to appear larger,” Jimaine comments over the clip, thickening her French access to a cartoonish level.  
“If the predator fails to heed her warning, she will attack.” Stephan adds, “This species is known for a move which field researchers have dubbed ‘stab the bastard and dump him off a cliff.’  
“I really did think mum and Vati might have murdered him,” Kurt mutters, laughing a bit in the back of his throat.
  * Magneto also, upon discovering the circus’ location, decided to splice his way into their security cameras. This did not yield as many videos as the magnetic mutant probably had hoped. 
    *       * “Jokes on him,” Prityi says, “Half the time those cameras don’t work, we just have them to make people think twice about creeping.” 
  * Only a few clips into the third disc, there’s a video of Mystique with Magneto in what appears to be Principal Darkholme’s office. It’s one of the few videos with sound. Magneto is dressed like he’s a normal person, his shoulders look strangely small without his massive cape, his face unremarkable without his helmet. Mystique rigid, every line of her body tight with angeer. She rounds on Magneto the second he steps into her office, form shifting and swelling into a looming figure, all sharp teeth and claws.  
  
“You said you’d leave them out of this.” She hisses, her voice echoing strangely in this form.  
  
Erik looks unmoved. “I said I would only engage with them as much as they got in the way.” he says, “It isn’t my fault they got in the way.”  
  
Mystique swipes at him with a long barbed arm, but Magneto blocks her with a filing cabinet. She sends the cabinet crashing into the wall, a shrill shriek of outrage ripping from her throat.  
  
“We had a deal, Erik.” She growls, “Torment your children all you want. But stay away from mine. Both of them.”  
  
Magneto flings the crumpled filing cabinet at Mystique’s head. She dodges, snarling.  
  
“My children are not tormented. They’re controlled. They will be stronger for my efforts. What about yours, Raven? What do you have except a pair of willful brats, leaving fires in their wake? Pawns for Charles to play with.” Magneto says, an edge to his voice and a scowl.  
  
Mystique rumbles but doesn’t rise to his bait.  
  
“Your son shivers when he looks you in the eye and your daughter tried to crush you with a helicopter.” She says voice dropping to a purr, “Nobody in this room, Erik, is winning parent of the year.”  
  
Mystique morphs back to normal, crossing her arms over her chest. “At least I have the sense to do what’s best for my children by keeping away from them. While at every turn you haunt yours squeezing tighter and tighter until they’re all but clawing to get away from you.”  
  
She glares around the room with an irritated huff. “Now get out. I need to clean this mess before morning or my secretary will faint again.”  
  
Magneto, shockingly, obliges. 
    *       * “Terrible parents’ club?” Rogue asks as the clip ends.  
  
“Terrible parents’ club.” Kurt, Wanda and Pietro echo her.  
  
“Do what Kurt did, get adopted by the circus.” Lila says.  
  
Kurt nods, “My parents have already imprinted on your for sure, Anna Marie, and frankly I think they’d adopt everyone in this room given half the chance.”  
  
Wanda and Pietro share a glance.  
  
“I miss mom.” Wanda whispers, squeezing Pietro’s hand.  
  
“About that,” Kurt says, “It was a magic thing, yes? I think I know someone who might help find her...if you would like to try.”  
  
“When,” Pietro asks.  
  
“We can go tomorrow,” Kurt says. “They’re seers. They may not know where your mom is right now, but they may be able to five you a lead.”  
  
The Brotherhood all scoot a bit closer to the twins, who bump shoulders sharing a glance before looking back at Kurt. Wanda gives one of her rare smiles.  
  
“Tomorrow.” She says. 
  * From the US, there’s plenty of footage from around the school, of the teens fighting in halls or behind buildings over the years. There’s a particularly brutal match between Todd and Kurt in the gym at the beginning of their junior year, just before the boys’ rivalry fizzled out into a reluctant, prank-based truce. In the skirmish, the pair grapple viciously, and Todd, after being swatted in the face by Kurt’s tail, swiftly bites him. Kurt jolts in the video, face twisting in a snarl as he bites the amphibious mutant’s ankle with a vengeance. Todd kicks him off and the two scramble apart, bruised and a bit bloody before there appears to be a sound off-screen and the pair scatter. Todd and Kurt break the silence that has fallen over the others with their own commentary.  
  

    *       * “The adolescent “ _furballis bluetanis_ ” is known for self-righteous posturing, claiming territory by asserting a moral high ground over rivals.” Todd drawls in what sounds like an attempt at a British accent but just seems drunk.  
  
“ _Kaulquappe_ , not yet fully grown, will avoid physical confrontation unless absolutely necessary.” Kurt counters in what is an uncanny impression of the Professor, “He defends his territory with crude genitalia based insults and threat displays, puffing himself up to appear larger.”  
  
“Cornered, _Kaulquappe_ uses his teeth as a defense, forgetting, like a jackass, that _furballis bluetanis_ ’ teeth are sharper, designed for rending of flesh.” Todd continues.  
  
“Enraged, _furballis bluetanis_ lashes out, latching onto what may be the worst choice of biting location on Kaulquappe, whose kick force has been documented at registers capable of flipping automobiles and shattering bulletproof glass. The bite lands, but the resulting kick dislodges _bluetanis_ , bashing him in the throat in the process.” Kurt says.  
  
“The rivals part, neither the victor.” Todd says.  
  
“They flee, territory unclaimed. Egos bruised.” Kurt finishes.  
  
The pair break into laughter and the room relaxes. Neither apologizes aloud, but they both hear it anyway.  
  

  * The newer footage shows less fighting though, becoming more varied in interactions. Some highlights include: 
    *       * Repeated incidents of Todd and Kurt running into each other around the school grounds, squaring up, then breaking into dance. The pair will flit up close to each other, almost touching before darting back from one another, breaking off into complex, seemingly unplanned movements. Todd’s style features sweeping broad movements punctuated by sharp, small rapid shifts while Kurt moves roundly, motions blending from one into the next. Some of the dance-offs ricochet from the serious into the ridiculous, each mutant clearly attempting to make the other laugh first with exaggeratedly goofy expressions and moves. Others stay serious, both moving as if the dance is in fact a fight. Regardless, not a single session involves trading of blows. 
        *           * “Damn, he’s smooth.” Jimaine comments on a particularly impassioned performance of Todd’s.  
  
“I told you all!” Kurt says, “I do not lie about these things.”  
  
Stephan shoots him a knowing look, “No, but sometimes other factors influence your judgment.”  
  
Kurt covers the boy’s face with a pillow.  
  
“You talked about my dancing?” Todd asks, hating the way his voice sounds hesitant.  
  
Kurt looks over at him, “I’ve told you before. You are fluent in the language. You speak with your whole body and it’s beautiful und brilliant.” He seems to catch himself and coughs a bit “What you say I mean, it’s beautiful.”  
  
Todd feels like he might burn from the inside out, and turns away from the sincerity in Kurt’s eyes.  
  
“Thanks, dawg.” He says, his voice soft.  
  
“Jawohl, it’s just truth.” Kurt replies.
      * Strangely, there’s also a dance scene between Kurt and Lance, though the tone seems more educational than competitive. Lance slinks into the room after Kurt, who turns and holds out his hand to the taller boy. He takes the blue mutant’s hand and suddenly they shift into a tango. Their movements start out stilted, Lance’s head tipped down at their feet and Kurt continuously tapping the boy’s shoulder with his tail to get him to look back up. After several minutes, something seems to click, and their movements smooth out. By the end of it, Lance is clearly leading, moving confidently, and smiling at something Kurt says. At the end of the clip, Kurt claps him on the shoulder and Lance reaches up to ruffle the blue boy’s hair. 
        *           * “You taught my boyfriend to dance?” Kitty asks, head swiveling to look at Kurt incredulously.  
  
Kurt shrugs from where he’s lounging in a pile with Jimaine and Lila.  
  
“Lance taught himself to dance, I gave suggestions.” Kurt says.  
  
Lance snorts, “That’s putting it generously.”  
  
Kitty scoots over to him from where she’d been piled up with Jean, Tabby, Rogue, and Wanda, “You learned to dance. For me?”  
  
Lance ducks his head, smile shy. “You mentioned missing dance.”  
  
Kitty pulls Lance to her, and if the kiss lasts a lingers for a little while past brief, no one says anything.
      * A strange encounter between Kurt and Jean out on the sports field that seems to be during gym one day. Jean’s in her cheer uniform, shaking one pom-pommed fist at Kurt in a wide gesture. Her back’s to the camera, but Kurt is in full view, and his expression goes from faintly worried to bewildered to hysterical in rapid order. He tosses his head back laughing. Jean tosses down her pom-poms and walks over to him, putting her hands on Kurt’s shoulders and appearing to speak. Kurt stops laughing, covering her hands with his own.  
  
They talk for several more minutes, appearing to come to some kind of understanding before they both freeze. Kurt’s face goes blank in the way someone does when a psychic goes rattling around in your brain. Jean jumps away from him as if shocked, hand flying to her mouth. Kurt shakes off the psychic residue before crouching down next to Jean where she’s sat heavily down in the grass, now half facing the camera. He puts a concerned hand on her shoulder, but she smiles at him. The clip ends with the pair hugging. 
        *           * Only the X-Geeks seem to understand what happened in this clip, breaking out in smatterings of laughter. Kurt looks amused but exasperated. Jean’s face is red.  
  
“Can someone give some context?” Pietro finally asks.  
  
Kurt tips his head back to look over at Jean, “I don’t know, can we?”  
  
Jean huffs, clearly embarrassed as she drops her face into her hands. “I will never live this down. Will I?”  
  
Kurt stretches out, reaching until he can pat her leg, “No. No, you won’t, but we don’t have to tell this story.”  
  
“No, no it’s fine.” Jean says, “I can eat some humble pie.”  
  
“Soooo, what happened?” Angelis asks.  
  
“I told Kurt he was gay.” Jean says, her voice tiny.  
  
The room erupts. Half in laughter, half in confusion.  
  
“You were very affirming about it though, which I appreciate,” Kurt says, patting her once again on the leg.  
  
“Gott, it was you who said that Jean?” Stephan asks, cackling.  
  
“You told them?” Jean asks.  
  
“Well ja, they’re very important to me, I figured they deserved to know this vital revelation about me.” Kurt replies, laughter in his voice, before he sobers, “I did not tell them who or about our conversation, just the announcement.”  
  
“No no, they need to hear what the hell you told us, mate.” Vin says, already trying not to crack up.  
  
“So for context, we all have group calls during the school year when we’re all scattered,” Prityi says. “And on our monthly call, Kurt gets on and goes--”  
  
“Did you know I’m gay!” Ehra says waving her hands with exaggerated surprise.  
  
“Someone told me this week.” Jimaine continues, carrying on the cartoonish impression of Kurt’s voice, “Now I only have to have a near heart attack when a pretty boy talks to me! I can relax around all the other babes. Really cuts back my nervous sweating.”  
  
“I kept seeing you think about boy’s asses.” Jean says, tossing her hands in the air.  
  
“Because half the time we look at the same asses!” Kurt retorts, “Of all genders!”  
  
Jean goes silent for a minute, her eyes unfocus as if scrolling through a mental Rolodex.  
  
“Okay yes, I’ll give you that.” She says finally.  
  
“Looking at boys' asses does not a gay man make though.” Todd says.  
  
Jean suddenly looks so deeply tired. “We go to a school of like, 2,000 kids. I have seen the minds of so many teenage boys. Kurt’s thoughts felt considerably...tamer than what I’d gotten used to.”  
  
Everyone in the room winces a bit, many of the boys looking guiltily off to the side.  
  
“It felt, impolite, not to screen my more private thoughts knowing what you might catch. I guess I wasn’t as careful about my boy butt thoughts over others.” Kurt says, shrugging.  
  
“Wait, is that why you’re always playing music in your brain?” Jean asks and Kurt nods.  
  
Tabby grins, “Blue, does that mean you’re always thinking naked people thoughts?”  
  
Kurt studies the ceiling, appearing to give the question serious thought before turning back to Tabby.  
  
“Only like 50% of my thoughts are naked people. Another 25% are half-naked people. That feels like an important nuance.” He answers.  
  
“Given what you showed me as “proof” of your bisexuality I believe that.” Jean comments, smirking.  
  
Kurt opens his mouth as if to argue before he stops, mouth twisting into a rueful smile as he shrugs.  
  
“There are worse things to do with your imagination.” He says.  
  
“Blueberry is the horniest mutant, who knew.” Todd quips, and Kurt throws a pillow at him.  
  
Rogue groans, “Oh god, can we please stop talking about this?” 
      * A moment that seems to be from last year, in which Tabby careens around a corner, grinning one hand over her mouth, she’s wearing a dress that appears to be borrowed from Kitty. She draws to a halt in the camera’s blind spot, the edge of her dress and tips of her sneakers just visible, fidgeting like she’s waiting for something. She doesn’t have to wait long. Kurt slips into the frame, not running, but movements swift and deliberate as if he’s hunting something. He stops just a foot from Tabby, his back to the camera. The hem of Tabby’s dress draws upward, out of the frame and there’s a beat of stillness before Kurt lunges forward. He connects and Tabby jerks forward, dress hem falling momentarily back into the frame. Tabby’s leg’s come up and her feet disappear out of the frame. Kurt slams the laptop closed before they can see anything else. 
        *           * “Well next time someone tells you you’re gay you can show them this as alternative proof.” Lila quips, patting Kurt on his head where he’s rested his face on the floor.  
  
“I can’t believe that’s what you borrowed my dress for!” Kitty says, looking at Tabby with horrified betrayal.  
  
“Oh Kit Kat, can you really claim you’ve never done the same in anything borrowed from me?” Tabby asks knowingly.  
  
Kitty sighs and drops the argument. Lance abruptly stands up, face red as he makes an excuse about needing water.
  * A lot of the circus footage is Kurt running around with the other performers, sometimes clips of them setting up for performances or breaking down camp, but most of it social, laughing, dancing, playing. Not all of it though. To Kurt’s mortification, some of the circus cameras caught several of his “dalliances” as Todd puts it. Apparently part of the summer tours with the circus included several lovers in several cities for the blue mutant. The earlier clips are innocent enough, but the ones from the last two summers grow increasingly bolder. To the point where Rogue turns her back to the laptops and refuses to turn around until the others say it’s safe, and Kurt slams the laptop closed on more than one occasion. 
    *       * “Behind the storage car, Mäuschen, really?” Stephan asks, hand to his chest, voice rising in mock scandal.  
  
Kurt, who’s had his face buried in his hands for the last two minutes, shoots a glare the other acrobat’s way. “Do not even, everyone fucks behind the storage car, Stephy, you included.”  
  
“This is true.” Ehra says.  
  
“But not everyone has a threesome behind the storage car.” Prityi counters.  
  
“I was wondering how those two finally got together, they’ve been dancing around each other every time we visited the Meath mutant grove.” Vin says, “Good job match-making with your schwanz there, mate.”  
  
“Both of them!” Angelis adds.  
  
“I’m glad you’re not bored without me during those long summers.” Tabby says slyly.  
  
Scott who retreated back to a farther bed in the room after the first clip that was over PG-13 pipes up from his safety corner, "Clearly, he's had his hands full."  
  
This breaks the room, and everyone collapses into laughter.  
  
Stephan claps a hand on Kurt’s shoulder, “Now what have we learned, my child?”  
  
“Turn the security cameras before fucking against walls.” Kurt answers without missing a beat.  
  
“Wouldn’t a better lesson be, don’t have sex in public?” Jean asks though she’s struggling not to laugh.  
  
“And take all the fun from life? Lady Grey, you and Major Lazer here need to expand your horizons.” Todd says, Scott kicks him in the foot, but there isn’t much heart in it, so he doesn’t take offense.  
  
Evan, who’s been staring into space the last few minutes says quietly, “I cannot believe that Magneto has seen you fuck. Presumably.”  
  
Blessedly, these tracks were several among a few dozen more innocuous commentary-free ones, but that didn’t mean the supervillain hadn’t seen them.  
  
“Hate to say it, but there’s nothing saying the old dude doesn’t have files on all of you. Including banging footage.” Forge says.  
  
That freezes the air in the room. Todd mentally reviews all the renovations they’ve made in the house and whether there were any unaccounted for holes or wires in the walls. He can’t recall anything amiss but still makes a mental note to go over all their electronics with a fine-tooth comb when they get back. Double for the lab too. Kurt’s file had no footage from either location, but it was better to be safe. He shares a glance with Lance, who nods at him. Same page then.  
  
Rogue breaks them out of it, standing up abruptly. “Now that I know way too much about my brother’s sex life, and have had to think about what information a weird old man with violent, mind-controlling tendencies might have on me, outside of the weird old man I already live with, can we take a break? It’s been hours and I want to eat.”  
  
The answer is a resounding yes.  
  

  * Not all the circus footage is so amusing. There are several clips of Kurt being chased and then goaded into fistfights by several of the older boys in the circus. One in particular, another acrobat, finds extra opportunities to single the blue teen out. Pulling his hair, bumping into him, or shoving past him when others aren’t watching.  
  
The last clip with the older boy is in a shadowy corner of the camp, away from the others. He corners Kurt, and the two exchange words. The older acrobat attempts to shove Kurt to his knees, but the blue mutant dodges. With a shout, he lunges for Kurt’s face with a knife. Kurt swerves, but the knife connects, and blood drips from a gash that slices the edge of his lower lip and chin. The blue mutant lunges for the other boy’s wrist. He connects, and twists. The older boy’s head falls back in a shout as he drops the knife. As the clip ends, several of the older adults run onto the scene. 
    *       * “That dude was a douche that whole summer.” Scott says and Evan hums in agreement.  
  
“He was always a pillock and a creep.” Vin says, “Gave everyone a hard time.”  
  
“What happened? He wasn’t there when we were last summer.” Kitty asks.  
  
Kurt shrugs, “The adults watched the tape. Saw what he did, he got fired. And I also, I’d broken his wrist, so he couldn’t perform anyway.”  
  
Jimaine scrunches up her face, “He was such a bastard about it too. Threatened to sue til we brought up all the sexual harassment he’d been giving us girls. Then turned around and said they couldn’t fire him cuz he was quitting.”  
  
“Fucking khota.” Prityi mutters.
  * Kurt has been training with Azazel and Riptide. With his parents’ permission. Kurt admittedly already knew this, but it was news for everyone else. Training in this case primarily seems to involve the two men taking turns charging the teen or baiting him into lunging for them. Riptide likes to use his powers to chuck any random refuse nearby at Kurt, trying to block his vision, while Azazel prefers to duel him, wielding a sabre to Kurt’s rapier. 
    *       * “The pseudo father figures, upon returning to the Nightcrawler in his adolescence, preoccupy themselves with the young mutant’s defense skills.” Pietro whispers in a terrible Australian accent.  
  
“In the art of the duel, the opponents circle each other, swords drawn. They move as slowly as possible. Their goal is to bore their opponent into a coma or drive them to madness, so they throw themselves on their enemy’s sword.” Scott drones and Kurt swats him on the arm.  
  
“Combat swordplay is significantly less exciting than performance swashbuckling.” Kurt says, “You either get skewered in five seconds or spend forever circling one another until yes, one of you snaps and probably gets stabbed.”  
  

  * Then things take a turn for the conspiracy theory in the fourth disc. There are fewer clips from the circus cameras or ones during the school year, instead, there are mostly news articles and screenshots from online forums, all with Magneto’s commentary. All of them from European publications and cites and all of them following a figure called “The Wolf” who is credited with swooping in at random in cities around Europe, stopping anti-mutant attacks, mostly on individuals. The forums track the months in which the most incidents occur, the times, and map out the route the cities make. There are debates about whether Wolf is one person or a pack, no one can seem to decide.  
  
But one case stands out, a news report on an older mutant which forums call Blight, not because of his powers, but his reputation. Last summer, Blight was dumped on the steps of the Glasgow authorities office, along with several hard drives full of evidence indicating trafficking of mutant children into freakshow circuits and worse.  
  
A nonmutant man, known as Screech, who had been charged with human trafficking roughly eight years before along with several other non-mutants who had been running an underground freakshow with mutant children, testified to working with Blight in the past. Authorities, upon raiding the man’s home, found recent evidence of children being held in his basement, though none were found. The forums, however, pick up the trail, speculating about several news stories covering the sudden happy resolution of a half dozen missing children cases throughout Spain, France, Ireland, and Britain in the days following Blight’s apprehension. The children all appeared suddenly, reunited with guardians, but unwilling to say who found them other than “the shadow.”  

    *       * “That is the route your troupe takes during its summer circuit, isn’t it?” Jean asks.  
  
“Jawohl.” Angelis answers.  
  
“Most of these timeframes are outside of your performance times.” Evan notes.  
  
“They are.” Prityi says.  
  
“Last summer when Rogue and I traveled with you all, you suggested we stay an extra week in Glasgow.” Kitty says, looking directly at Kurt, “Which we did. Blight was dumped on the cops’ doorstep that week.”  
  
Kurt nods, “That is all true.”  
  
The circus kids all glance at each other. The X-Geeks and the Brotherhood all trade glances. Todd snaps.  
  
“Yo, you’re not gonna say anything else?” He asks.  
  
Kurt looks at him sideways, expression stoic, but a triumphant twist to his lips.  
  
“I had a score to settle in Glasgow.” he says, and the other circus kids break out into terrible wolf imitations at the same time.  
  
“I am so visiting you in summer.” Tabby says and Kurt smiles.  
  

  * In the last video, Kurt doesn’t appear at all. It’s instead set at what Pietro and Piotr identify and Magneto’s Bayville area hideout. The footage begins with Magneto looking over something at his desk. The lights blow out and there is a boom and dust billows into the room as the door blows off its hinges. When the debris clears, Azazel is crouched on Magneto’s desk, his hand on the other man’s throat. Riptide stands just behind him, two small whirlwinds hovering in his palms. Metal in the room begins to levitate, but Azazel snarls something, and Magneto goes rigid, hands snapping to the arms of his chair as if strapped in place.  
  
“You forgot I know a little magic, Herr Lehnsherr?” Azazel says, voice dripping with sarcasm. “You sit. We talk. No metal powers.”  
  
Azazel jumps from the desk, sending it screeching across the room with a kick as Riptide steps out of the way. The pair pull up chairs, each close enough to Magneto’s seated form that their knees touch. Riptide pulls out a cigar, holding the tip out to Azazel, who lights it with a flame from his thumb. The tornado mutant takes a long pull, blowing the smoke into Magneto’s face, who scowls. Azazel pulls out a pipe, blowing rings into the air as he exhales.  
  
“Did you know our baby is alive,” Azazel says. It’s not a question. “Our child. Now nearly a man. Calls someone else Vati. Calls someone else mum.”  
  
Magneto stays silent.  
  
“For 16 years,” Riptide says, picking up the thread, “We thought our child was dead.”  
  
He lunges forward, grabbing Magneto by the collar, “Because you killed him!” He shouts. His voice echoes harshly off the office's high ceilings.  
  
Magneto turns his head away, “Raven--”  
  
“Acted like a clumsy hot-headed ass.” Azazel finishes, “Which she always does. But whether she slipped or dropped him on purpose, she would not have run at all if not for you.”  
  
Both men are silent a long moment, each smoking, grey wisps drifting slowly from their lips.  
  
“What happened to you, Erik?” Azazel asks, rolling onward without waiting for an answer, “In the camps. You know what they did, you experienced their horrors. My brother died holding off several of the bastards so my sister, mutter, and I could escape. You lost everyone. Magda lost everyone. So why, why do this?”  
  
Magneto’s face purples with rage, “Do not compare me to their atrocities! It is not remotely the same!”  
  
Neither Riptide nor Azazel says a word, the room is silent.  
  
“I want a better life for all of us. For our people.” Magneto says, “And I will do what I must to create that future.”  
  
The two other men stare at him for a long moment. Azazel leans forward, tapping out the ashes of his pipe onto the office rug. He grinds them into the expensive-looking fibers. The red mutant tucks his pipe back into his jacket before facing Magneto again.  
  
“You are lost, my friend.” He says, like friend means ‘motherfucker’, “Rage instead of fueling you, has devoured you, trapped you in a dream of a future that obscures the present’s beauty from you. When is the better life, if it isn’t now? Look at you-” He gestures between himself and Riptide, “-at us, and Raven and Destiny. We put our rage before ourselves, before our children and where are we? With empty homes. As our children are raised in other houses, as they raise each other. We are fools.”  
  
Riptide leans forward and catches Azazel’s hand. Azazel turns to him, his face drawn. After a moment, he smiles. He lifts the other man’s hand to his lips, planting a kiss on his knuckles and pausing there for a moment. They part, and he turns back to Magneto.  
  
“For years, I dreamt of cursing you.” Azazel says, “I considered it many times. I had lost my son. I failed my husband. What did I have to fear of backlash? But years grew and I moved on. The pain was there, but so were other things. You, once huge, once a beacon of rage in my mind, mattered less. And then, two years ago. Riptide calls me. Crying. He’s seen a boy, with practically my face. A boy who leaps from buildings and teases him when he shouts at him to watch it. We have not spoken in over a year, yet here he is, crying to me on the phone. ‘From the dead, our child returns, raised in someone else’s arms.’ All over again, I lose him. Because I am not this boy’s father. Not since that night. But the 'Tide pulls me back, ‘Meet him.’ he tells me ‘See who he is.’ I did not want to. But I went.”  
  
Azazel stops, voice choking with emotion as he looks away. He runs a hand over his face. Riptide, whose face has been wet with tears since Azazel mentioned the phone call, runs a hand over the red man’s back.  
  
“He is so good,” Riptide says. “Better than I dreamed. Better than I think we would have done, as parents. Strong, gentle, foolish, clever, brave, kind. You could not have made him in your lab. But he will be part of what makes your dream real, in ways you cannot understand.” he shares a glance with Azazel. “I am not a father, but I am still something to him. Because I chose to be. Because he lets me. Because he lets us. What do you choose to be to your children, Erik?”  
  
The two men stand, turning towards the door they came through. Azazel pauses.  
  
“I dreamt of cursing you my friend, but my efforts would have been wasted.” He says, “You cursed yourself. Magda, brilliant, powerful, fled your arms. The more you chased her the farther from your hands she went. Your children bloom before you, where your hand should help them, you bruise their leaves. They are making the future you dream, they and their companions, in spite of you, not because of you. But you miss it all. Here. In this place. Because you cannot leave where you were. How long will you let this go on?”  
  
He turns away from Magneto, loops his arm through Riptide’s, and the pair vanish in a cloud of smoke. Magneto lurches forward in his chair, fumbling out of it and onto the floor. The only sound is his ragged breathing as he crouches on elbows and knees. He gives a low shaky cry, but the video cuts short. 



  
“Fucking christ, is dragging people to hell genetic, because shit, dawg.” Todd says as the video ends.  
  
Wanda has his hand in a vice grip from her spot next to him, and he rubs what he hopes are soothing circles into her knuckles with his thumb. Tabby is on her other side, smooshing herself into Wanda’s space. Pietro is crowded against Todd’s other side. The four of them are practically in Freddy’s lap, as Lance leans back on them all, a hand on each of the twin’s knees casually as if it’s an accident.  
  
“Nature and nurture, clearly.” Lila says, “You haven’t heard his Mum when she gets going.”  
  
Vin snorts, “His mum, what about Uncle Adonay? I can count on one hand all the times I’ve heard Kurt's vati lose it, and every time the other person looked more devastated than if he’d physically thrashed them.”  
  
Kurt doesn’t reply. Todd glances over and feels panic tighten his chest to see tears streaming down the other mutant’s face in the dim room. Stephan and Ehra, who’d both flopped into Kurt’s lap partway through the video, catch it too and reach up to cup the blue mutant’s face. A sob rips out of Kurt’s throat at their touch. Angelis wraps his arms around the other boy from behind, shushing lowly and rocking all four of them.  
  
Kurt presses his hands to his face, body shaking as he cries.  
  
“For so long. I thought I was thrown away.” He says, words blurred by his tears. “I thought I must have been garbage. Expected to disappear. I never thought anyone missed me. Wanted me.”   
  
Pretty much the entire room is crying or pretending they’re not crying at this point. Rogue worms her way through the pile of teenagers that have glombe onto her brother, until the two sit face to face. She wraps her arms around his neck, the curtain of her wavy hair the only barrier between their cheeks.  
  
“You are so annoying.” She says, and Kurt huffs out a startled laugh, “You never left me alone. Before we even knew. I’d turn around and half the time you’d be there. Begging me to play. Asking me questions. Roping me into shit. I didn’t know I missed you but then we met. All my life, I missed you, until you were there, critter.”  
  
“You tease me all the time, but you always listen, and still help me do whatever thing I know I’m being way too particular about.” Scott says.  
  
“The three of us couldn’t sleep for a week without you in the train car, the first time you left for America.” Vin says, snuffling into Kurt’s shoulder.  
  
“There was no one to trick into sleep talking at us.” Stephan says, and Kurt laughs, tugging the other boy’s hair.  
  
“You literally saved me from being lost in time and space dude.” Forge says.  
  
Prityi has Kurt’s tail in her hands and is casually tying a random ribbon she found around it, “You’re the only one who can sneak cookies past Uncle Ruslo, but you’ve always shared anyway.”  
  
Freddy abruptly scoops the entire Brotherhood up and shuffles them over to where nearly everyone has piled into the center of the room. On his way, he nudges Piotr, Scott, and Jean where they’ve been hovering in between the two crying human piles. He stops once the groups completely collapse into one massive pile of crying teenagers.  
  
“You helped us in the woods that day. And then you kept showing up. All those days after.” He says as they all settle into the pile.  
  
More murmurs follow around the room. First focusing on affirming love for Kurt, but then echoes follow, an affection fest blooming out of the moment until everyone's face is wet and they're all mumbling about how grateful they are for each other.  
  
It’s Pietro who starts it, singing quietly “Thank you for being a friend.”  
  
Wanda groans, but Freddy joins in loudly, “Travelled down the road and back again!”  
  
Kitty chimes in along with Todd and Lance, “Your heart is true, you’re a pal and a confidant.”  
  
Piotr and a couple of the circus kids look confused, but their lips twitch with barely controlled laughter as the rest of the room gives in and joins the first five in belting out the words.  
  
The song tapers off and they fade into a silence that feels like a day-old bruise.  
  
“Can we all stop having big feelings now?” Lila breaks in from where she’s squeezed herself between Angelis and Kurt, “My face is so itchy from crying.”  
  
Kurt breaks into barking laughter, reaching back to wrap his hand around Lila’s scaly arm.  
  
“Ja, I think that sounds good.” He says, “Maybe we all chillen now? No more dramatic life revelations until tomorrow?”  
  
There are murmurs of agreement. And so that’s exactly what they do. And it is good.


	11. A sudden Unpleasant Sensation: Kurt & Wanda

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay, honestly y'all, the last three chapters were full of things I wanted to write forever, but they put me through the wringer to get out and I don't know if anything else that comes through this series will top them. 
> 
> That said, this chapter and the next few whenever I finish them change directions a bit, jumping back in the timeline to before the Euro trip. I can't say how many more pieces I have in me for this timeline, I know I've churned out a lot really fast, but things may slow down a bit from here on out. 
> 
> It's always rubbed me the wrong way how Todd kisses Wanda wearing a completely different face. As much as I love the cranky frog, I don't want to pretend a consent breach like that was not a thing. And the way I start shifting events in this series, I decided to keep the image inducer fight between Todd and Kurt, so that meant addressing how he acted with Wanda. And Kurt, being a hyper responsible blueberry, I imagine would feel a responsibility here too. 
> 
> So here we go. 
> 
> Content Warning for nonconsensual kissing by way of hidden identity, and descriptions of violence and public shunning.

I’m sorry.” He says, “For that day when Todd kissed you. That was my fault.”

He and Wanda had been repainting the Brotherhood living room one afternoon when Kurt finally pushes the words out past the wall of guilt and shame they’d been tucked behind since last year. They’d been working from opposite sides of the room, Kurt with a warm brick orange and Wanda with a pale buttery yellow. They would meet in the middle blending them together into a sunset. 

Kurt’s twisted around to look over at Wanda. Her back is to him, several streaks of yellow paint on her black overalls where she’s absently wiped her hands on her legs. The line of her shoulders is rigid under her faded purple T-Shirt. 

“How do you figure?” She asks without turning around. 

Discomfort and shame wriggle like eels in Kurt’s gut. Admitting any of this makes him wish for the floor to open and swallow him, but he sucks in a breath letting it out in a sigh. Hiding his bad choices wouldn’t make them go away, it would just leave them to rot under the floorboards until their damage was too big to pretend anymore.

“He didn’t steal the image inducer from me, after our fight.” Kurt says, “I let him borrow it. And he used it to kiss you with another person’s face. You didn’t know it was him until after. That was my fault.”

Wanda turns slowly towards him. Looking at him from the corner of her eye. Her short, dyed hair is tucked under a faded red bandana Lance had dug up from somewhere. There’s a paint smear on her cheek. She sizes Kurt up, from where he’s standing, paint roller wrapped in his tail. He resists the urge to shrink back, to cross his arms over his chest, to look away.

She crosses the room with heavy clomping steps despite being barefoot. The paint roller is still in her hand, dripping down onto the plastic sheeting they’ve half assedly spread out over the old hardwood floors. They’d shoved all the furniture into the hallway before starting so she has a clear path. In five steps she’s squared up with Kurt. The blue mutant swallows, exhaling slowly. She has a right to be angry. And he has a responsibility to listen, to learn what he can do to right this.

“Did you know he would kiss me like that?” Wanda asks. 

“No, but--” Kurt starts, but she cuts him off. 

“Why’d you let him have it?” she asks. 

Kurt’s eyes fall to the floor, studying the crinkly thin plastic bunching around their feet. He dripped paint on his toes at some point. It will take forever to get that out of his fur. Wanda wriggles one foot side to side, shuffling it heel toe heel toe across the floor, a gesture of impatience that reminds Kurt that she and Pietro are siblings. Kurt makes himself lift his head and say this to her face. 

“Because the day I got this image inducer, I learned what it was like to walk down the street with no one screaming, with no one chasing or hitting me. People didn’t flinch at the sight of me, they didn’t avoid my touch. I could go anywhere and be smiled at, and trust it was not a gesture of pity. It was amazing. It was horrible.” He says, the words falling out of him, he holds up the wrist where the image inducer sits, “This is like a prison I carry with me. A millimeter thick wall between me and the world, if anyone touches me even with it on, the magic shatters and I am revealed. But for so long before it, no one, save my family would touch me as I was. And even they still startle sometimes at the sight of me. So I knew, how Todd felt, that desperation to be really seen, even if it means erasing yourself. Because I do it every day.” 

She watches his face the entire time, hazel green eyes unreadable, her full mouth set in a line. Kurt tapers off in a shrug.

“I understood his feelings, but did not condone his choices.” He says, “But you bore the consequences of my choice. My reasoning does not undo that. And if there is a way I can make amends with you, I would like to.” 

Wanda stares at him in silence long enough that Kurt feels the fur on the back of his neck rise in anxious prickles. 

“Paint’s real hard to get out of your fur, isn’t it?” Wanda asks, glancing thoughtfully down at their feet, only a step apart from each other. 

Thrown, Kurt answers a quiet yes, following Wanda’s eyes down to their feet. He’s barely answered her when he feels something spongy and wet collide with the back of his head, before rolling down over his ear, across his jaw, down his neck and over the front of his shirt. 

He snaps his head back up to stare wide-eyed at Wanda. He opens his mouth, then gags as paint drips into his mouth. He roughly wipes a hand across his lips without thinking, smearing yellow paint over his arm. He turns to spit on the plastic, away from them both before swiveling to look back at the dark-haired mutant. He’s dropped his paint roller to the floor. His tail lashes bewildered anxious arcs behind him.

Wanda stares at him, a satisfied smile spreading across her lips, still holding her paint roller up at shoulder height. Kurt can’t help the small giggle that escapes him at noticing a few strands of his blue fur matted into the paint there. 

“Now you’ve been surprised by a sensation you didn’t want or expect,” Wanda says, tugging her hair bandana off and offering it to Kurt, gesturing at his paint-smeared face. 

Kurt reluctantly takes it, opening his mouth to argue, but paint drips in it again he’s back to gagging and spitting. Wanda openly laughs at him this time, a deep cackle from her belly. 

“Look. No it isn’t the same, but I’m not going to stage someone catfishing you.” She says, “Yeah you gave Todd the inducer, but he made the choice to kiss me. And he said sorry, in words, but also in his actions. It doesn’t take it back, but it lets us go forward.” 

“This” she says, jiggling the paint roller in her hand, “Lets us go forward. Okay?” 

Kurt laughs. “Okay.” 

They’re quiet for a moment, Kurt awkwardly trying to pull himself out of his overshirt without smearing more paint on himself, Wanda watching him in a way that radiates satisfied amusement. He finally frees himself from his shirt, considering briefly whether he should try to soak it or something, before giving up the idea and just abandoning it on the floor with a wet plop. He glances back at Wanda to find her studying him like a safe door that she’s trying to crack. He freezes under the scrutiny.

“Are you the one who said something to Todd about just asking girls to be mean to him?” Wanda asks.

Kurt glances away, covering a laugh with a cough. He flashes back to an argument out in the back fields behind the school last semester, close to when spring gave way to summer, and the taste of blood and grass in his mouth and anger blazing like a wildfire through him. 

“Ja, that might have been me.” He says, rubbing the back of his neck. He winces as his hand comes away sticky with buttery yellow paint. 

Wanda chuckles, a raspy sound in the back of her throat. “Good advice.” Kurt bursts into laughter caught off guard again.

Later, when the others trudge in from their excursion to the junkyard and the hardware store, arms full of such a random assortment of things Kurt’s certain half of them have nothing to do with the house and everything to do with the spirit of “fuck it, it’s free and may be handy,” they come into Kurt and Wanda having a truly terrible sing along to an oldies station. 

Todd’s the one who notices the smears of yellow paint in Kurt’s fur where the blue mutant failed to fully wash it out. 

“What happened furball, did you fall in?” He asks. 

Kurt only shrugs, he and Wanda sharing a look.


	12. Always Check the Label: Todd & Kurt (& Everyone)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Kurt tries to skip out on taking his pain meds after getting thrashed in a fight with the Acolytes, medication labels are read not quite perfectly, and the rest of the gang finds out about Todd and Kurt's "Secret Nap Time" when they all gather for their monthly movie night despite the weird sort of war their creepy bosses are trying to get them to fight.
> 
> Content Warning for:  
> mentions of teenagers in combat situations  
> injuries resulting from said combat  
> accidental drugging in an innocuous context  
> weed usage  
> inaccurate portrayal of cannabis-based pain medications  
> characters being stoned  
> mentions of racist Disney movies  
> awkward cuddling  
> Dr. Hank McCoy's questionable prescription practices and really casual response to a patient's reaction
> 
> This may be the most self-indulgent chapter I have written so far, not gonna lie, I'm a sucker for the "flimsy excuse to cuddle" scenario.

“Katzchen, what dose did Herr Doctor say I needed to take?” Kurt asks, the words rolling slowly out of him like he has to think about each one. 

For all intents and purposes, things felt like a normal Saturday movie marathon, the fight yesterday with Magneto’s Acolytes--and the Brotherhood’s lack of attacking the X-men, or joining them--goes unmentioned. Todd had started the afternoon feeling like ants were crawling in his veins, but Evan and Kurt started juggling equipment within the first 10 minutes of the X-Geek's arrival. Then Rogue and Lance were scolding them and yelling at Pietro to grab things before someone got hurt, or something broke and the tension melted out of Todd. The Brotherhood, Forge who insisted he was a free agent, and the hodgepodge of X-Geeks who deigned to hang out with them had been hanging out for an hour when Kurt abruptly interrupts the group’s traditional endless movie debate before the first film is shown to question Kitty about his apparent medication habits. 

“I gave you what he said.” Kitty huffs, face pinching in irritation, “Which you’d know if you could be trusted to take pain medication instead of just suffering.” 

Kurt hums, his voice sounding weirdly distant as he tips his head in Kitty’s direction. It’s hard to read on a guy with no pupils, but Kurt’s eyes don’t seem to fully land on the bubbly mutant, instead they drift in her general direction at the far end of the couch with Lance.

The Brotherhood glance at each other confused. Todd stops his efforts to make a transforming toaster and kicks his wheelie chair over to where the others are. Forge trails behind him on the significantly squeakier rolling stool. Tabby and Amara seem to catch on to whatever’s happening. Tabby scoots closer to Kurt, squeezing his wrist before looping an arm around his shoulder. Kurt melts immediately into her side like he has no bones, sighing. Amara turns to Kitty with a raised eyebrow. 

“Kitty. How much did you give him?” Amara asks. 

Kitty’s shoulders creep towards her ears. She lurches up away from Lance to sit up straight. “Oh my God, I read the bottles over Kurt’s shoulder when he got them. It said two. I gave him two!” 

Her defensiveness crumbles into concern and she leans over Evan and the other two girls to peer at Kurt. The blue mutant’s eyes are closed, his face buried in the crook of Tabby’s neck. If Tabby weren’t holding him up, it looks for all the world like he’d collapse face-first into the couch. 

“What’s wrong?” Kitty asks, her voice dropping to a concerned hum, “Dr. McCoy said the whole point of these pain meds were them being low risk.” 

She reaches out patting at Kurt’s knee in a way too fast to be soothing. 

“Kurt, hey, hey, say something.” Kitty says, her voice almost a whine, “Look at me.” 

Kurt cracks his eyes open, with what looks like extreme effort. He slides his hand over Kitty’s, stilling her increasingly frantic rubbing of his knee. He moves slow and languid in a way Todd’s never seen him do outside of the moments they first wake up together, after what the pair has dubbed “secret naptime” during their senior break periods. 

Todd shoots a wide-eyed look over to Lance, who returns it with his best ‘everything is gonna be okay, I’m sure it’s nothing’ mom friend look. Only Lance’s knee is jumping up and down in a way that belies his own anxiety. Pietro, who has thawed to the blue mutant in the last couple of months, has started lapping the side of the lab behind the chilling area. He moves just fast enough that his edges blur, a pace he insists is still ‘walking.’ On the second couch, Freddy and Wanda share a fretful look with Forge, whispering quickly back and forth in voices too low for Todd to catch. Todd plucks the old gyroscope he’d found among Forge’s crap from his back pocket and nervously begins spinning the layers. Rogue unfolds herself from where she'd been sitting in the smaller bean bag at Wanda’s feet to crouch in front of her brother.

Kurt reaches out to brush Kitty’s face with a smile, but he kind of misses and ends up bumping her in the chin. Rogue squeezes his unoccupied knee with one hand, and he drops his grin on her.

“I don’t think this is bad, but I don’t think I’m useful today.” He says. 

This sparks a nervous laugh from Forge. Kitty whips away from Kurt to glare at him and the mechanic holds his hands up apologetically. But when she looks away, his expression turns thoughtful, eyes roaming over Kurt the way he looks at a newly salvaged computer’s guts.

Evan pries himself from the X-Geek & Lance pile on the couch, digging his phone out of his pocket.

“I’m gonna go call the Doc.” He says, then turns to Kitty, “Come with me? You know what he took and together we can explain what’s going on?”

Kitty glances anxiously back at Kurt, but Tabby smiles reassuringly up at her and Amara squeezes her arm. 

“There’s like nine of us with him, girl. We won’t let anything happen.” Amara says.

Kitty bites her lip but nods turning to Evan. 

“Yeah, okay.” She says. 

Evan catches the key fob Forge tosses him and the two disappear up to the surface. As soon as the hum of the lift fades, Forge turns back to the group, something strangely amused in his expression.

“So, what’s in the medication the Fuzz took?” Forge asks like he already knows the answer.

Kurt’s answers before the other X-Geeks. In the last few minutes, he’s slumped even further into Tabby, tossing one leg and his tail over the arm of the couch. His tail weaves wobbling, lazy circles in the air.

“Gras.” he says, voice breaking into breathy laughter.

Forge and Tabby lose it. 

Forge doubles over onto Fred’s shoulder from where he’s perched on the arm of the other couch. Fred looks at the other boy like he’s grown another head, but raises a hand to steady the mechanical mutant. Rogue turns to look over at Lance, who holds up his hands in exasperation. Wanda shoots Todd a bewildered glance, gesturing at Forge and mouthing “what the fuck?” to which Todd can only shrug. 

Tabby for her part rocks precariously sideways, swaying Kurt with her as she laughs in a way that borders on hysterical. She bumps the two of them up against Amara, who tips forward before sitting up and wrapping an arm around her girlfriend's shoulder to steady them.

“Liebling, know if you fall over, we’re going together,” Kurt says, patting the arm she’s wrapped around his chest with one heavy hand. His voice still has that amused, dreamy quality.

The longer the pair laugh, the lighter the room gets. Todd feels his own lips twitching up into a smile, and notices Amara biting her lip like she’s holding back giggles. Their eyes meet for a second, and a snort escapes Todd’s throat before he can stop himself. He spins his chair in a circle just to break eye contact before he cracks up. 

“Can you two enlighten the class?” Rogue asks, glaring at Tabby like she’s considering poking the answers out of her barehanded.

Todd, who’s been swirling around the room anxiously in the wheelie chair chimes in, “Yeah, a translation would be helpful.” 

Forge pulls himself up, wiping his eyes as he looks at Todd, “Sound it out, man. The translation is pretty direct.” 

Todd mouths the word “grass” to himself and sees the others who’re not laughing in the room do the same. His eyes widen as it hits him. A bark of laughter falling from his mouth. 

“Weed!” Pietro yells before any of the others can get the word out, coming to a stop so fast he almost falls on his face. He draws out the “ee’s” voice rising in incredulity towards the end. 

“Bingo!” Kurt hoots from the sofa, tossing one hand up. 

It’s the most animated he’s been in the last ten minutes. The absurdity of the situation shatters the remaining tension in the room. Laughter breaks over them like a wave. Rogue laughs so hard she does tip over, landing on her ass with a yelp. This sets everyone off even harder.

“You’re telling me fuzzball’s stoned right now?” Todd gasps.

“Ja, completely blass.” The blue mutant answers. 

Evan and Kitty choose this moment to come back down the lab’s lift. Kitty has one hand to her forehead. Evan looks like he’s trying not to laugh. Everyone quickly rallies themselves, spare giggles escaping them as they try to wrestle themselves back into seriousness. The returning pair don't seem to notice.

Evan turns to Kitty, pointing to her with his hands pressed together, he asks, “Kitty would you like to share what happened?” 

Instead of replying, Kitty wheels on Kurt, looming over him where he’s huddled into Tabby. The irritation on her face is enough that Todd flinches back a little, but the blue mutant gives her a bland look, his tail still turning lazy circles in the air.

“This wouldn’t have happened if somebody didn’t try to sneak out the fucking door without taking his medication!” Kitty says a finger reaching out like she wants to jab Kurt in the arm, but knows it will hurt him.

“I’ve had worse.” Kurt says as if it’s a brilliant counterargument. 

Kitty screams without opening her mouth, a muffled screech of frustration. She phases her way through everyone’s legs to shove Lance back onto the sofa, before following after him, dumping herself into his lap. She leans back against his chest with her arms crossed so she can glare in Kurt’s direction. The blue mutant can’t see her with Tabby’s shoulder blocking them, but that doesn’t stop Kitty.

Evan ignores them both, turning to the group, “The Doc gave Kurt these weed-based meds because he said they had a lesser chance of reacting poorly. Kitty accidentally gave Kurt a double dose of his night meds, which are stronger. Which is why he’s bombed right now. She’s the one who gave them to him because we were literally in the car to get over here when we caught that Kurt tried to sneak not taking his meds.” 

Kitty covers her face with her hands, “Dr. McCoy laughed so hard.”

Evan continues, “Kurt will, as he guessed, be useless today, but he’s fine.”

Freddy scrunches up his face, looking at Kurt in confusion, “Why wouldn’t you take your meds, you got, like thrown through a wall.” 

Kurt’s tone is more flippant than his words, “Because bad shit can get the jump on you when you’re out of it.” 

Unease filters back into the room, but Forge stops it before it can take hold. He kicks away from the couch, squeaky stool screeching as he wheels his way over to a dusty bin in the corner.

“This solves our movie problem for the day.” He says, dumping the contents of the bin onto the old milk crates that served as a coffee table in front of Wanda and Freddy. 

A pile of dusty VHS’s mixed with a few DVDs and even older-looking film reels spill out, the bright colors of their covers faded. Todd is very much sure some of those are pornos, and from Wanda’s unimpressed stare and Freddy’s blush, he’s right. 

“VHS was invented in the late 70’s, how do you have these?” Pietro asks, before several of the others hiss at him and he shrinks, realizing his mistake. 

Forge’s smile fades a bit, but he shrugs, “I got stuck only a couple of years before they were a thing. My friends kept using the lab til I graduated...hoping I’d come back.” 

He roots around through the pile, clearly looking for something in particular, “but some of these Todd and I salvaged from the local junk shop. I even have some DVD’s I’ll have you know.” 

“A thoroughly modern man.” Tabby says, and Forge blows her a kiss.

“You get me.” he says.

“I don’t think my current…” Kurt trails off as if trying to find the word before giving up, “whatever really matters much for the movie choice. I have a feeling I won’t remember it.” 

"It's about the atmosphere though, man." Forge says, "It's about the vibe you remember, not the plot." 

Rogue drags the larger bean bag chair to sit between the two couches from where it’s been piled up in a corner. A burnt orange corduroy monstrosity, it puddles on the floor with a faint hiss, like a massive, ancient orange cat. 

“Critter I think you better lie down.” She says. 

Kurt untangles himself from Tabby’s arms, sliding off the couch with more grace than Todd expected him capable of at the moment. He slips down into his four-limbed way of walking, hopping up onto the bean bag in a motion that makes all the X-Geeks wince. Todd realizes the Brotherhood didn’t see the outcome of the scrape with the Acolytes yesterday, but Kurt’s uniform had been streaked with blood. Kurt wriggles down in the beanbag chair, half disappearing into it. He’s quiet for a minute, before breaking into a low whine. He drags himself back up into a sitting position. The X-Geeks all hiss again at the looseness of the movement. 

“Dude, your stitches.” Evan says, reaching out as if he expects Kurt to somersault away at any moment.

“Wait, you have stitches?” Wanda asks, leaning forward. 

“Like 6, 8...less than 10.” Kurt rambles, “In my thigh, it’s nothing.”

“You also have like 3 bruised ribs.” Kitty says.

Kurt shrugs, “At least they’re not broken.”

Kitty grabs one of the throw pillows that Pietro has been steadily adding to the lab’s sofas over the last couple of months, lifting it as if to chuck it at Kurt’s face. Evan snatches it back with some effort, jerking it back down to the couch.

“You can’t. He’s an injured man.” Evan says seriously. “And a stoned moron who will dodge and rip open all his stitches.” 

Kurt ignores them, or forgets how conversations work, Todd can’t tell. His eyes swivel lazily around the room before landing on the amphibious mutant. He beams, eyes lighting up like Todd’s what he’s been looking for. He holds his arms out, making grabby hands.

“Frosch, Nickerchen!” He chirps, tail weaving behind him.

The room freezes. 

Todd absently recalls that Wanda and Pietro know at least a little bit of German, and from Rogue’s too knowing look she’s managed to pick up enough from her brother. On the sofa, Tabby’s face is lit up with the kind of glee she usually reserves for the destruction of property, her eyes flicking between Kurt and Todd. Amara’s arm on her waist seems to be the only thing stopping her from getting up and dragging Todd over herself. Forge's look is quietly knowing in a way that makes Todd feel raw inside.

Todd panics, briefly considering refusing to go to the blue mutant, but Kurt manages to look as pitiful as a wet kitten while completely dry and Todd’s half certain the furball will come to get him if he doesn’t move.

Pointedly not looking at anyone but Kurt, Todd hops the half room of space between them. He tries to ignore the fluttering in his stomach at the soft, thrilled smile Kurt gives him as he drags Todd down into the beanbag.

An unasked question fills the room as the others look on in silence. Kurt either doesn’t notice or is unbothered, because he’s still fixated on trying to figure out what position he wants to lie down in, prodding the other mutant with his tail as he shifts this way and that. Tabby starts emitting a low “hmmmmm” sound in a blatant attempt to get Todd to crack. 

It works.

“We’ve been napping together on break periods,” Todd says, trying to act like it’s nothing even though he feels like a cornered porcupine at the moment. “It helps with the cold and Blue apparently doesn’t sleep much at night.” 

“It hasn’t dropped below 40 degrees yet.” Pietro says.

Todd does not have a comeback for that, but avoids answering by focusing on trying to keep the noodly blue mutant wiggling around him from injuring himself further. Todd’s still sitting up, and Kurt has flopped back on his side, wrapping himself around the amphibious mutant’s back. He’s attempting to pull the other teen to lie back on top of him, using his body as a backrest, which, no.

“Dude, you have broken ribs and multiple stitches. Me flopping on you is no.” Todd says, pulling away. 

“Bruised.” Kurt mutters petulantly. 

“Wow, what a distinction there.” Todd says. 

“Found it!” Forge says, waving a VHS case that’s seen better days in the air, “Fantasia! A classic for this occasion. But the modern cut that doesn’t have the minstrelsy, just the weird orientalist shit.” 

The room’s attention shifts over to the mechanic and Todd feels the tension in his chest let out. Tabby shoots him a look when he sighs and he flinches, but her smile softens from mischievous to something tender. She turns away without saying anything, instead replying to Forge.

“Way to sell it there, bud.” She says. 

Forge shrugs, “Look it has bright colors, pretty images, and a lot of music. It works.” 

“Shouldn’t we order food?” Amara asks. 

“Got it covered.” Kitty says, “Hope everyone’s chill with Gino’s pizza and wings.” 

“Oh fuck yeah.” Tabby says. 

“Good forethought.” Lance comments. 

Evan shrugs, “If you don’t look out for each other, who will?”

Todd’s taken this opportunity to maneuver him and Kurt into a position that hopefully won’t strain the blue mutant’s injuries too much. This unfortunately means he’s essentially big spooning Kurt as he lies on his good side. After trying to find a place to put his free arm that wouldn’t earn him any ribbing from Tabby or grilling from Lance later when they’ve all gotten home, Kurt loses patience with him, snatching his arm out of the air by the wrist and pulling the amphibious mutant's arm around his waist.

“I’m barely able to think, but I can practically hear your brain combusting.” He murmurs, weaving his three fingers in between Todd’s five webbed ones. “Chill.” 

Todd can feel the blue mutant’s heartbeat under his palm and against his chest. He’s trying not to memorize every single place the pair are touching. Over the last month or so, the two have woken up in increasingly tangled positions after their secret naps. Every time, Todd rockets from pleasantly drowsy with his face buried in the blue teen’s shoulder or hair to panicked as he realizes where he is, who he’s with, and how good it actually feels to be wrapped up in the furball's arms. This is the first time they’ve started out so close completely awake. But, sure, chill.

Blessedly, Forge kicks off the lights and starts up the projector with Fantasia and everyone settles in. Rogue returns to her smaller beanbag, but Pietro and Forge park themselves on the floor cushions between the two beanbags. The one he and Kurt are on is high enough that Todd can’t really see them when he glances over. They’ve been engulfed enough by the squishy expanse of orange corduroy that coupled with the cover of dark, he can pretend no one can see them. By the second song of the movie, he’s relaxed around Kurt. The blue mutant sighs, leaning back against him more fully. 

Kurt’s wriggled down, but his mop of hair drapes over Todd’s bicep, blocking a little bit of the screen. Of course, the urge to fuck around overwhelms Todd’s anxiety of being so cozy with the blue mutant in front of everyone. He blows out a short puff of air, ruffling the dark indigo locks. Kurt shifts the tiniest bit but does nothing. Todd waits a couple of minutes and blows again, this time a little harder. Kurt’s hair flies up, and Todd catches him biting back a giggle. The short sound fills Todd’s chest with giddy bubbles, and he blows again, several short bursts this time, tilting his head a bit to catch one pointy ear. Kurt dissolves into a giggle fit this time, rubbing his face into the fabric of the bean bag. He reaches a hand back and drags Todd’s hair in front of his face, shoving his shoulder back. Todd huffs a laugh, shaking his hair out of his face. He curls around Kurt and darts his tongue into Kurt’s ear, lightning-quick, but gentle as he can manage. The impact is worth it. Kurt squeals with delighted disgust, his tail flailing to smack Todd in the leg several times. He twists his head, dragging Todd's sleeve up with one hand, his tongue following, pressed flat as he licks a long wet stripe up the amphibious mutant’s arm. It’s Todd’s turn to squeal, as he resists the urge to buck and jostle the injured mutant. Kurt’s tongue isn’t rough, but it has an interesting, bumpy quality that makes goosebumps prickle over Todd’s skin in ways bound to haunt him later.

“Children, do we need to separate you?” Kitty asks from the couch behind them. 

Shit. Todd had forgotten that they were, you know, in a room full of their friends. 

“No!” Kurt whines out the word, craning back over Todd to look at Kitty with pleading eyes. 

Todd stops himself from laughing, but can’t help the little knot of relief that unwinds in his chest at the blue boy's insistence. Amidst the other’s amused looks and laughter, Lance catches his eye and he freezes a little bit. The expression on the older boy’s face says they’ll be Questions later. 

“We’ll play nice.” Todd says, tearing his eyes away from Lance. 

Tabby’s lips quirk up in a way that implies Todd will regret whatever comes out of her mouth next, but a chime rings through the lab and he’s saved by the chaos of the food arriving and everyone figuring out eating arrangements. Kurt stays right against him even as they eat. Slumping so his good side is pressed hip to shoulder against the amphibious mutant’s. He smells like sleep, a little sweat, and something kind of peppery and sweet. Todd tries not to freak out about how familiar that scent has become, how it makes him relaxed but his skin also hums a bit with a feeling he’s scared to poke at. They obliterate the food with the same speed a swarm of piranhas might dismantle a very unlucky cow.

When the meal’s over and everyone settles back in, Kurt pulls them down the other way this time, so he can lay facing Todd with his weight on his good side. Todd shoots the blue mutant a confused look but goes with it anyway. 

“You don’t wanna see the screen, fuzz?” He whispers, and Kurt shakes his head.

He wriggles down a bit, so his head is tucked under Todd’s, resting his head on one arm, draping the other across Todd’s middle. Todd hesitates only a moment before resting his arm beneath Kurt’s draping over the blue mutant’s hip. From Kurt’s contented sigh and the way he nuzzles his head a bit into Todd’s chest, this was the correct choice.

Once again Todd’s filled with a thousand ants at a techno rave from having this much contact with the blue mutant while awake. In the hand of the arm he’s laying on, Todd keeps playing with the gyroscope to cope. He swings his forearm in absent, lazy arcs behind his head, listening to the slight, clicking whir the little metal toy makes. He feels Kurt’s head shift slightly, and he tips his own a bit to steal a glimpse at the blue mutant’s face. His eyes are half-closed but seem to be tracking something behind them. He doesn’t seem to notice Todd’s attention. Todd shoos away the butterflies bursting through his chest at the sight, distracting himself by looking backward to see what has the blue mutant’s attention. 

His eyes land on the gyroscope, likely barely visible to Kurt behind Todd’s head. The whirling loops of metal flash with the light from the movie screen in front of them. Todd tests his hypothesis, shifting his head a little bit in a way that should give Kurt a better view of his hand. The blue mutant sighs, head shifting a bit. Todd bites his lip to keep from laughing at the furball’s obvious fascination. He stays in that position, though it’s going to give him a crick in his neck and forces himself to pay attention to the movie. He keeps playing with the gyroscope though, and after a while, he feels Kurt grow heavy against him, the three-fingered hand that's been rubbing slow, gentle sweeps up and down Todd’s back stills. Todd lets himself sneak another look at the blue mutant’s face and finds him sound asleep. His lips are slightly parted, tips of his fangs peeking out over his bottom lip.

Todd makes it through the beginning of the second movie, which is something about a bunch of talking appliances before he loses time between blinks. He tips back a bit, and Kurt goes with him, a warm, limp weight on his chest. He has one hand fisted in Todd’s sleeve by his shoulder, his tail wrapped around Todd’s calf, broad spade pressed into the arch of his socked foot. Todd’s thoughts drift, catching snippets of the steady soft commentary from the other teens mingling with the quiet rasp of Kurt’s breathing. 

His eyes blink open in the middle of the third movie, as a woman in a red dress shoves a masked man dressed head to toe black down a hill. Kurt’s shifted to lie on his back, face turned away to watch the screen. His injured leg is half up, a triangle of light shining from the movie shining through the gap under his knee. Kurt turns his head to look at him, his gaze clearer now, though his expression still has a drowsiness to it. He gives Todd an apologetic smile. 

“Sorry.” he mouths, gesturing between them and the surrounding room with the hand resting on his chest. 

He says that but Todd can’t help but notice his tail is still wrapped around Todd’s ankle, and one blue hand rests on the wrist of the arm Todd’s draped over his middle. Yes, there will be questions later. For both of them probably as soon as they climb into their respective group’s cars. There are probably questions the two of them should ask between them. But Todd can’t muster up concern for any of that right now. Not with Kurt still pressed, warm and lovely up against him. 

Movie day lasts through a fourth film, neither of them doze off again, but they don’t move apart either until the lights come back on and everyone putters around tossing their empty takeout boxes and putting the room back in some semblance of order. Kurt’s movements are stiffer now, and the others scold him when he tries to bend over or lift anything heavier than an empty pizza box, but no one mentions his and Todd’s cuddle fest on the couch. 

Outside the last of the sun has faded away underneath the weight of a fall drizzle. Everyone mutters their goodbyes with the usual hugging and waving. Todd expects the questions to begin the second the Brotherhood all pile into Lance’s Jeep, save Tabby who goes with Amara back to the Mansion, but none come. Pietro immediately starts naming everything he found good, bad, nonsensical, or thought could have been done better from the day’s movies. Wanda gives his knee a squeeze from her seat beside him in the back, and Freddy drapes his arm across both their shoulders like always, giving Todd a soft smile when he glances up at the taller mutant. He catches Lance’s eyes in the rearview mirror, and freezes, expecting a stare loaded with questions. But the look Lance gives him is surprisingly gentle, corners of his eyes creasing a bit in a smile. Then his gaze slips away as he reverses out of the parking spot and they rumble their way home, beating the storm by a handful of minutes.

And later that night, if Todd finds himself knocking shyly on Wanda’s door, the memory of a warm blue hand pressed against his back having left a cold ache in his chest, she doesn’t say a word about what she finds on his face when she lets him in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so true confessions, I actually have very little practical knowledge of the experience of weed or edibles, so this was a lot of bullshitting on my part. And definitely a misrepresentation of cannabis as a form of pain management for my own petty motivations. If my depiction of stonedness is inaccurate, I ask you kindly to forgive my sins.


	13. It's Time to D-d-Duel!: Kurt vs. the Fencing Club

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This, if you squint, can be an answer to the Kodd Revival prompt of Shapeshifter!Kurt, only he doesn't shapeshift at all, everyone just thinks he does. 
> 
> Featuring schoolyard shenanigans, fencing with makeshift weapons, and a very unimpressed blueberry. 
> 
> Content warning for bullying verbally and physically.

“WAGNER!” A shout rings out across the schoolyard as everyone’s eating lunch one cloudy wednesday afternoon, loud enough that the conversations of the hundred or so seniors scattered across the grass quiet down for a moment.

Todd glances over toward the source of the noise, from where he and the rest of the Brotherhood are sprawled under one of the big, gnarled oaks on the campus. He hears Freddy suck his teeth curiously behind him, and Lance grumbles something. 

“The ‘W’ is pronounced with a ‘V’ sound, Chance, I already told you.” Kurt says, not turning around from the picnic table he and the other X-geeks are sitting at. 

A few feet away, Chance, who heads the school fencing team, whose existence blows Todd’s mind, because what in the WASPy suburban fuck does this school need a fencing team for, is standing, arms crossed with the other team members gathered behind him in varying states of “did not want to be here but was made to show up.”

Todd jerks his head to catch the blue mutant’s attention. When Kurt’s eyes land on his, he mouths “What the fuck?” but Kurt just rolls his eyes and mouths “Later.”

“Duel me in your beast form. I know you’re stronger then!” Chance says.

Last year, Kurt’s image inducer had failed at school in front of a crowd. The fallout had been not great, but not the pitchforks and torches situation the blue mutant seemed to expect. A huge swath of the school took to breaking out in whispers whenever the blue mutant entered a hallway, despite his continued use of the inducer. Hilariously, instead of believing Kurt’s fuzzless form was a hologram, for some reason the rumor had taken hold that Kurt transformed like a werewolf, his blue form being his “beast mode.” Less hilariously, this had led to attempts to make Kurt “beast out.” Students dropping books near him in attempts to startle him, yanking his hair when he wasn’t looking, even spilling drinks over him. 

The harassment had tapered off though, after one day when Kurt ripped a group of kids pressuring his ex, Amanda, into telling them details about dating “a beast” and implications that she must be into real freak shit. It’d been in the middle of the main hallway where everyone lounged around before the first bell, and Kurt’s voice had wrung out, low and harsh. He’d made it clear that people could annoy him about his mutation, but Amanda--or anyone else he’d hung around with--were off limits. Since that day, Amanda’s friends had joined her in defending the blue mutant when something came up and the X-Geeks or brotherhood weren’t around. There was still the occasional attempt at goading the blue mutant, but things had died down mostly to continued rumors and speculation. Todd surely hadn’t seen anyone outright demand the furball change.

Kurt’s face clouds with a look of utter irritation. “Ah yes, so much stronger. It’s the blue, you know.”

Todd presses a hand to his mouth to stifle a laugh. The rest of the Brotherhood don’t bother, breaking into hoots and cackles. Behind him, he hears Tabby mutter “Jackass,” and Amara whispering her agreement. The rumors about Kurt having a “beast mode” had become a running joke among the mutant teens. Periodically someone would ask Kurt to open a jar of pickles, or get something down off the shelves that were only reachable by ladder by “going beastmode.” Over at the picnic table, several of the X-geeks are clearly trying hard not to join in. 

Kurt turns towards Chance, grumbling as if the other teen’s interrupted him in the middle of trying to find world peace.

“This is weird man, I hope you know that.” he says but heaves himself up from the table anyway. 

Chance brandishes an honest to god pair of swords from the fencing club’s equipment, holding the handle of one rapier out to Kurt, who looks at it as if he’s being offered a live banana slug. 

“I am not getting expelled for fencing a clown without proper safety equipment in the middle of the school yard.” Kurt says, turning back to Kitty, “Katzchen, can I borrow your umbrella.” 

Kitty tosses him her straight, red and blue hello kitty umbrella, “You break it you buy it.” 

Kurt waves her off with a smile, before sobering and turning to Chance, “Choose your weapon.” 

Chance’s face has gone an alarming shade of pink. He sputters, tossing the two fencing swords back to one of his teammates, who have reluctantly gathered a few feet from the pair. He snatches a significantly drabber umbrella from the hands of one of them before wheeling on Kurt, weapon raised. 

“Reveal yourself!” Chance says. 

“Really, you should buy me a drink first.” Kurt says, and Chance gives a muffled screech as several of his teammates and onlookers burst into giggles, “but okay.” 

Kurt drops his hologram. Murmurs break out in the crowd as they do every time the blue mutant shows himself au natural. Todd’s chest aches at the tension he notices in the teen’s shoulders, the way his tail makes a close, tight circle by his calves. 

“Well? En Guarde.” Kurt says, sounding impossibly bored. 

Chance lunges for him, body turned sideways, arms raised and umbrella out in a way that makes him look like a crab with a knife to Todd. Kurt dodges, not even bothering to shift his own umbrella from the neutral position he’s raised it in, elbow tucked close against his waist. He shifts sideways, rotating them clockwise so they’re turning a slow circle on the blacktop. The rules of engagement seem clear to the dueling pair, but Todd is lost. They keep moving in a circle, Chance lunging periodically, Kurt either dodging or blocking him, body relaxed to Chance’s live wire position. Something shifts, and Kurt darts forward, striking Chance in the side. 

“First blood.” One of the fencers calls, which, dramatic much? 

This seems to make Chance snap. He redoubles his efforts, lunging faster and more often for Kurt, who continues to look like he’s embarked on a mid afternoon shopping trip he’d really rather not have. Chance manages to land a blow on Kurt, which the team calls out. But Kurt gets two more hits to the boy’s arm and thigh, and that seems to end the match. Chance does not lose gracefully. 

“Milo!” He shouts, storming back over to the clump of fencers, who’ve been clapping politely at the close of the match. 

A tall, tan boy with a mop of shaggy brown hair and the best facial hair a teenager could hope for grunts as Chance shoves the umbrella against his chest. Chance gestures back towards Kurt, who gives them a lazy wave. Milo groans and steps forward.

“Sorry dude, if I don’t do this, Chance’ll annoy the shit out of me all month with drills.” Milo says, and Kurt shrugs. 

“No big thing,” He says, then waves a hand motioning Milo forward, “Come.” 

The taller boy does, moving at a pace that matches Kurt’s much more than Chance’s did. They’re smiling at each other as they turn the circle, and this time Kurt jabs first. Milo blocks him clicking his tongue. 

“Oh sloppy sloppy Wagner.” He says, a smile on his face. 

“Forgive me, I get a little reckless.” Kurt answers, and there’s something in his tone that sends a shiver down Todd’s spine. 

This fight continues the weird lazy susan pattern, but this time both swordsman move slower, more calculated. They chat casually the whole time, Milo complaining about a chem test he should be studying for, Kurt commiserating about a debate class speech he still needs to finish before 6th period. They’re tied at one point, two for two, when Kurt seems to catch some kind of opening and lands the final strike. The duel ends with both fighters, giving each other exaggerated bows, umbrellas pressed across their chests. Milo waltzes back over to the fencers with an utterly unsorry apology to Chance.

“Perry, Mason! Restore the honor of the fencing club.” Chance says, and Todd wonders how this guy handles the kwikimart being out of his favorite candy, or like, getting a B. 

“We don’t have anything to use.” One of the two boys says, “Milo only has one umbrella.” 

“Yeah, it’s not very fair if one of us gets an umbrella and the other has, like, a stick.” the other says. 

Chance looks like he might actually explode, Todd kind of hopes he does. The blond stomps his foot, searching around the nearby grass. Two onlookers take pity, each proffering a yard-long stick to one of the two remaining fencers, who take them with an exaggerated austerity as if handling the crown jewels. Kurt waits patiently this entire time, idly chatting with Milo about his chem test and how the taller teen thinks that will go, and drinking from his water bottle after Rogue tosses it to him

The two fencers look at Kurt, look at each other, then raise their sticks in a decidedly unfancy swordsman way and charge Kurt screaming. The blue mutant breaks into a delighted laugh, moving quickly to dodge one boy’s strike and block the other’s with his water bottle, accidentally spraying all three of them. Kurt drops the water bottle and Milo tosses him his umbrella. Suddenly the blue mutant is wielding two faux swords as easy as if he were jumping rope. 

“Have at me! You, periwinkle pirate wannabe!” One of the pair shouts, swinging his foam sword in an exaggerated arc that Kurt easily bats away. 

“Is he periwinkle? He looks more a cobalt to me?” The other says as Kurt blocks an axe chopping swing to his knees. 

“I like to think I’m more of a lapis personally.” The blue mutant offers, and his opponents pantomime deep consideration of this before nodding.

This fight goes in this way all across the schoolyard. The two fencers pursue Kurt around the yard, shouting fake, shakespearean insults at the blue mutant who returns them in kind. They charge Kurt and he jumps, pushing off their foam swords with his umbrellas and flipping through the air to land on one of the picnic tables. The occupants of said table lean back hooting and clapping, then scatter as the fencers clamber up after Kurt. The table becomes a stage, the three jousting back and forth with each other. At one point, one of the fencers nearly falls, windmilling his arms chaotically, face wide eyed in false horror. Kurt hooks his tail around the boy’s middle hoisting him back up and the fight continues. The duel ends with Kurt dying dramatically, skewered on either side by his opponents’ blades. He swoons his way down to the table, crying out some line about the wine dark sea that Todd recalls from them reading Beowulf last year in class. 

The schoolyard, which had fallen silent in the midst of all the action, bursts into applause. The fencers help Kurt to his feet on the table, and all three take a bow.

“I hope you’re satisfied. The villain defeated by your men.” Kurt says, with mock solemnity as the three wander back over to the rest of the fencing team.

“Dude no, this is a tragedy.” says Perry, or Mason, Todd has not bothered this whole time to figure out which is which.

“Yeah, we’re definitely the baddies. You were just chilling eating your lunch and here we came all ‘rawr, duel us, Count of Monte Cristo.” The other says, clapping his hand on the blue mutant’s shoulder.

“Man, I keep telling you, that is not what happens in that book.” bro one says.

“It should be.” Bro two counters. 

“Anyway! Sorry for interrupting your lunch man, good luck with that debate speech.” Milo says, tossing an arm around Chance’s shoulders in a move that looks more like a headlock than a gesture of friendship. 

He turns with a cheery wave and leads the fencers away, raising a hand in thanks when Kurt wishes him luck on his test.

Later, when Todd meets Kurt in the lab during their break period, the blue mutant’s explanation is glib. Chance had caught him practicing fencing moves one day in the gym and the blond had insisted Kurt was his nemesis ever since. Todd laughs so hard he spills his soda over the motherboard he’s working on. He scrambles to clean it with a curse and Kurt appears beside him with a rag. He takes it with gratitude. 

“Well, enjoy that rivalry lasting forever there, Count of Monte Cristo.” Todd drawls. 

Kurt’s responding laugh is pure sunshine.


	14. In the Eye of a Storm: Kurt and Todd

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This one's a double hitter for the prompt challenge, covering both Torpor again, and the "Kurt has a secret cabin in the woods" Because I'm a sucker for that hurt comfort and "cuddles under certain peril" trope. 
> 
> After the Acolytes split the Brotherhood and X-men from their teams, Kurt finds himself lost in a snowstorm with a rapidly crashing Todd. He fights the panic rising in his chest as he scrambles for a way to get the amphibious mutant out of the cold and frets about the fate of their friends.
> 
> Content warnings: 
> 
> Mentions of injuries from canon typical fights  
> Snowstorms in dangerous contexts   
> Fainting   
> Child endangerment, as usual with Mags and Xavier  
> Description of anxiety attacks

Kurt catches Todd right before the amphibious mutant drops into a snowdrift. 

He curses, hands shaking from more than the cold as he pulls Todd against him. The shorter teen’s face is pale and his lips are starting to purple. His eyes are white under their lids, rolling. 

Kurt strips off the jacket of his own winter X-suit, wrapping it around the boy’s front, tucking his arms against his chest. The storm kicked up suddenly in the middle of a bizarre fight with the Acolytes, in which they were gunning for the Brotherhood just as much as the X-Kids. Magneto’s older team had focused on splitting the younger mutants, isolating them from one another. The wind and sleet had turned the forest, the mutants were scrabbling into an icy, slippery mud pit, and then the temperature had plummeted, sleet giving way to fluffy impossible to see through snow drifts. 

Todd and Kurt had flanked each other as soon as a gouge of fire from the frankly obnoxious Australian mutant had split them from their teams. They’d taken up into the trees, but Pyro had pursued them, sending gouts of fire into the air, cackling. They’d been forced to head back aground unless they wanted the entire forest to burn down with everyone in it. By the time they’d lost Pyro, they’d become lost themselves and the storm kicked up rapidly freezing the air around them. It couldn’t have been more than 10 minutes before Todd had dropped, taking Kurt’s heart down with him.

Kurt tries hailing both of their teams through their comms. A month ago Todd had made the Brotherhood a second set of comms units, ones they could trust wouldn’t connect them with Mystique or Magneto. Kurt’s relief at having a secure line shatters when neither team has signal. Only static comes through when he puts out the X-men’s distress code for pickup.   
A gust of wind blows a break in the falling snow and Kurt freezes, dropping low and tugging Todd tight against his chest. Across the clearing, the mutant who Kitty’d told him went by Colossus spots them. The massive metallic mutant looks just as startled to see them as Kurt is. They stand there, the howling wind the only sound for a moment, before there’s a shout in the distance. Gambit, hailing Colossus. 

The taller mutant looks directly at Kurt, his surprisingly soft voice drifting to him over the wind. “I never saw you. Hurry.” 

And then Colossus turns, disappearing into the storm. Kurt here’s him give a muffled shout that he’s found no one. Then they’re alone again. Todd’s heavy and stiff in his arms. There’s no time to consider what the Acolyte’s intentions are. The pair are too far from the others. Or either of their home bases to make it back reliably, even if Kurt teleports. Kurt secures his coat over Todd’s chest before tossing him over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry. The amphibious mutant doesn’t even stir. Kurt crushes the panic pressing heavy against his ribs down deep. He can deal with it later when there’s time to have a wheezing, crying episode about how often they’re all brushing up against deal lately.

Now he teleports to the highest tree branch he trusts to hold their combined weight. From up high, he swivels, arm still clamped around Todd’s hips, searching the dim surroundings for anything he recognizes. Panic almost draws him back down into its icy depths when he spots a familiar, craggy boulder shaped like an old man’s nose. Hope, so light and warm that a near hysterical laugh bursts from Kurt’s lips, blooms in his chest. He knows that rock. There’s an old cabin, likely used for hunting nearby. It’s in porting distance. Kurt turns again, and hopes he remembers the feeling of the place correctly. He bows his head and ports, a little prayer to whoever is listening on the back of his tongue as he goes. 

They reappear in a dusty but well maintained one room cabin. Kurt’s knees buckle with relief. He stumbles to avoid dropping himself and Todd straight to the packed earth of the cabin’s floor. The air is musty, the log building clearly shut up for winter. Reluctant to put Todd down when his own body heat feels so crucial to keeping the other mutant from disappearing completely into torpor, Kurt pries open the heavy wooden heirloom chest that sits at the foot of a small cot that’s been draped in a dust cloth. Luck is working overtime for them, there’s a faded, hideous blue and brick orange quilt and an old knit blanket folded neatly in the trunk’s depths. They’re dry, and so is the cot. 

Kurt uses the dust cloth to get as much snow melt as possible off both him and Todd, scrunching the amphibious mutant’s brown locks. The other teen is beginning to shift around a bit, stillness ebbing away as he drifts from unconsciousness sleep. Kurt hesitates a minute after stripping off his own damp thermal shirt. Skin to skin transfers body heat the best, but it feels wrong to strip the unconscious mutant bare, even in these dire circumstances. Especially given Kurt’s no longer so platonic feelings for the amphibious mutant. Kurt splits the difference, stripping himself and Todd completely to the waist. He hangs their clothes on a line that’s strung across the room. The log cabin is tight enough that while the air is cold inside, there’s not a draft to be found. Kurt hopes it’s good enough that their clothes won’t freeze. 

He pulls Todd into his arms on the cot, swaddling them, sitting upright in the quilt and blanket. He wraps himself as tightly as possible around the shorter mutant, rocking them and rubbing his hands and tail over Todd’s limbs in firm sweeping strokes. After a few minutes, he tries the comms again, but gets but garbled static. Dread, begins creeping in, bringing visions of their friends captured, both bases compromised. The dark wooden walls around them begin to feel tight. Kurt has to pull in deep slow breaths to keep memories of prying, pitying crowds and steel cages from creeping in, from the fear that no one is waiting for them and there will be no rescue from swallowing him. 

He presses his face into the crown of Todd’s damp hair, breathing in the shorter mutant’s scent. Todd has that sharp smell of fever sweat coming on, but underneath is the smell of ponds after fresh rain, clover, and musk that somewhere in the last few months automatically pumps fluttery contented feelings through Kurt’s brain. Todd has gone from completely still to shivering, making small murmuring sounds in his throat. Kurt keeps rocking, rambling aloud in hopes that it will bring Todd closer to awareness. He doesn’t pay attention to what he’s saying, jumping from subject to subject. He talks about how Kitty sings in the shower and he can hear her through the pipes sometimes. How he misses being roommates with Evan, but actually respects the boy’s choice to join the Morlocks, to choose a hard path because it sits right with him. He talks about how when they first met, Scott was terrified to dance, but now Kurt’s caught him more than once boogying in the kitchen doing dishes or in the garage working on his car. He tries not to get choked up, but his throat feels tight. 

He talks about catching Freddy feeding the stray kittens in the alley behind the Brotherhood house and how he’s started sneaking bags of kibble into their storage closet for the younger boy. How Lance and Scott actually have similar tastes in music and he kinda wants to see them find out. How he’s scared if he gets closer to Wanda and Pietro, their birth parents will make things way worse for all of them. How he’s so so happy Rogue is his sister, that he wants her to have everything. That Tabby scares the shit out of him but may be the most loving person he knows. That even though he’d been with the X-men for a couple months, Forge felt like the first person to take his hand without flinching in America. That he regretted his first words to Todd were an insult. That they had fought for so long. 

“Me too, fuzz.” Todd’s voice says, muzzy and distant. 

Kurt almost loses his balance, rocking them nearly off the bed. He pulls away, trying to see Todd’s face and the amphibious mutant whines in protest, weakly wrapping his arms around Kurt’s middle. 

“Please say more things.” Kurt says, pretending he doesn’t sound on the edge of tears.

“More things.” Todd mumbles, but Kurt can feel his smile against his fur.

Kurt dissolves into a wet laugh, which becomes a sob before he can stop himself. He heaves several shaky breaths trying to get himself under control, but he’s shivering now, everything crashing over him at once. Todd’s hands start rubbing slow, unsteady circles on his back. 

“Easy, easy.” He says, voice growing stronger, “Fuck blue, you’re gonna give yourself a hernia.” 

Kurt chokes, a hysterical giggle breaking through the tears. Todd tilts his head up, pressing his clammy forehead to Kurt’s cheek. On reflex, the blue mutant tips his head down, rubbing his face against Todd’s. A feeling too big to name swells in his chest. 

“I should be comforting you, I think. Not the other way” Kurt says. 

Todd snorts, “Pretty sure there’s room for mutual freakouts in this situation.”

He tips his head towards the ceiling, snuggling deeper into Kurt’s chest as he peers around the room, “Care to fill me in?” 

Kurt does, listing over everything. They pause to try the comms again when he mentions them being out, but still there’s only dead air. There’s a hiccup in the conversation, before Todd nudges him and Kurt carries on his account as if there isn’t a looming unknown hanging above their heads. 

Kurt finally runs out of words, tapering off into silence. He continues to rock them, at this point just as much for warmth as his own comfort. The storm outside has died down, the wind falling silent, but the light is starting to fade in between the cracks in the storm shutters. They’re just treading into the realm of talking about what to do when a familiar blazing presence goes through both their minds. 

“Kurt, Todd, Can you read me?” Jean’s mind voice asks, a pressing urgency bleeding through the connection. 

Kurt has to stop himself from crying all over again. Todd’s wet shaky curse indicates he’s feeling the same. 

“Ja, Jean, where are you, where is everyone?” Kurt says aloud, just because he can. 

“Safe. Everyone’s safe. But where are you, we’re looking.” Jean says, sending him a mental picture of her looking around the woods, her gaze skipping over Rogue and Freddy a few feet from her. 

Kurt sends her a mental picture of the rock and the cabin, his memory of the area around it in fall. 

“We’re close. Stay put.” Jean says. “We’re coming.”

It’s maybe 10 minutes before there’s a bang on the door. The pair huddled on the bed jump at the sound, and Kurt ends up tripping over his own feet, legs awash in pins and needles when he tries to cross the room to open it. The lock opens by invisible hands and there’s a crack of ice as the door is jerked open from the outside. Freddy’s bulky form ducks through the doorway, Jean and Rogue scrambling after him. 

He crashes into Todd, and Kurt yelps in surprise as the tall mutant scoops him up along the way. The boy’s broad shoulders are shaking as he mumbles into Todd’s shoulder, sentences punctuated by heaving gasps. Todd’s rubbing the younger teen’s shoulder, grumbling at him. But smooshed up with the two mutants, Kurt can see Todd’s cheeks are wet. Rogue elbows her way into the pile, petting anxiously over Kurt’s tangled mop of hair as soon as she reaches him. She even slaps a hand out to Todd’s cheek, patting him absently as if to reassure herself that he’s there.

“You little shit. Keep scaring me like this and I’ll be the one to put you in an early grave.” She whispers in his ear. Her hair sticks to the tear tracks on her face. 

Jean doesn’t join the hug pile, but Kurt can feel her mind prickling over him, concern and relief and “are you okay, are you hurt” coming through. Todd stiffens then relaxes beside him and the blue mutant figures he’s not the only one getting mind hugged.

Jean fills them in as Kurt and Todd get dressed and the others put the cabin back the way it was at Kurt’s guilty look. The Acolytes retreated with the storm and Mystique with them. Everyone had filtered back together, mostly uninjured. Though Pietro had sprained his ankle sliding on the ice, and Scott had minor burns from a near miss with Gambit. Rogue’s face twists in something between anger and regret when Jean gets to this part. The adults had followed in pursuit of the Acolytes, after ordering the young teams to head back. This prompted an explosion of dissent as everyone tried to figure out where Kurt and Todd were. The compromise had finally been the search party of Jean, Rogue and Freddy, with the others returning to their bases on standby.

“The snow has stopped, but it’s still a long trek back.” Rogue says, as they make their way to the cabin door. 

There’s only a few inches of snow on the ground, but it’s still blistering cold outside. Todd shivers where he’s pressed against Freddy’s side and Kurt shoots him an anxious look before turning his face upwards. The sky has cleared. Kurt gets his bearings and does the math. 

“I can get us to the Brotherhood house from here,” He says. “It’ll take two ports, but I can do it.” 

“We are not a small number of people, dawg.” Todd says, suspicion for Kurt’s bullshit bleeding into his voice. 

Rogue crosses her arms and narrows her eyes at him, “Critter.” 

“It’s the best plan.” Jean says, like she’s swallowed a mouthful of mealworms. “Even once we clear the forest, we can’t be sure the Wolverine, Storm and Beast have circled back yet. We may not have a ride.”

She looks at Kurt, her face twists like she’s put her hand in a bowl full of jello, “It’s better to port now, while you’re less exhausted than to try it after a four mile hike when we have no ride.” 

“You can always rest at our place when we get there.” Freddy says softly. “And eat. We order celebration chicken after a mission where no one dies.” 

Kurt glances at Todd, unsure if he should laugh at that, but the other teen is smirking at him from his place tucked under Freddy’s arm, and the tall boy is biting back a grin.

“Sounds good.” he says, letting a laugh escape. It only sounds a little hysterical. 

They all huddle around Kurt, putting their hands on his arms and shoulders. Rogue makes them all gather behind him, her hand is a firm weight on his shoulder. 

“Try not to fall on your face when you pass out from this.” She says. 

Freddy and Todd share an alarmed look, but before they can object Kurt laughs out a quick “no promises” and they’re going, disappearing from here into the place of heat and roaring sound. One port, and Kurt feels the creeping lurch of the rebound from taking so many people with him. He remembers that breakfast was his last meal and night definitely fell at least 30 minutes ago. He ports again before he can finish the thought. They land in the familiar yellow orange sunset of the Brotherhood living room. He hears someone shout in surprise, but his eyes don’t listen to his brain. The mint green ceiling tilts before his eyes and his vision whites out. He feels someone--Todd--collapsing against his elbow. Then arms are around him and the world is a dark muffled tunnel, lined with the concerned murmurs of overlapping voices.

A warm body is pressed up against his, somewhere soft. He hears the sounds of music and the low hum of conversation from somewhere. He turns towards the warmth, burying his face against a t-shirt clad side that smells like clover and marshlands. Closer, there’s a sound of cards shuffling. An arm lowers and wraps around his shoulders. A firm, broad hand squeezes his bicep gently. 

“You among the living again, Fuzz?” asks a familiar drawl. 

Kurt tries to lift his head, but it feels like someone’s filled his skull with water. He settles for wriggling his way up a bit. The room is dimly lit, but the light still brings a sharp ache to his temples as he cracks one eye open. He’s in Todd’s room. More accurately he’s in Todd’s bed. 

A game of uno is spread out over the worn comforter. One of the lambskins that’s usually on the floor is draped over their legs. Kitty and Tabby are lying on top of it, their weight comforting over Kurt’s feet. The warm body next to his is in fact Todd’s, the blue mutant notices absently. A gentle hand ruffles his hair. He glances back to see Rogue plastered against his side, sitting up in the bed, only three cards are left in her hand. Wanda is pressed up against Todd’s other side, one arm draped over his shoulder. Jean, Lance, Freddy, and Pietro are scattered around the bed, all staring at their cards with varying levels of apprehension or satisfaction. Jean sets a card on the pile.

“Uno” Jean says, and everyone groans.

“How come you’re awake, but I wasn’t?” Kurt asks, trying to keep the sulkiness out of his voice. 

“Because I didn’t completely black out when we got back, and got to eat hot food and shower. While you fainted into Jean’s arms like a damsel in distress?” Todd answers, hitting a reverse card and forcing Lance to pick up from the pile. 

“No, you fainted into my arms.” Freddy says, voice a bit smug from his seat on a floor cushion. 

“I lost my balance.” Todd argues. The others grunt in varying tones of ‘not buying it, but sure Jan.’

Kurt absently notes he’s no longer in his uniform, but dressed in what feels like a pair of pajama pants and an old shirt. He’s too tired to feel particularly embarrassed about it. 

“You need a plate critter. We kept it in the oven for you.” Rogue says.

“I can get it real fast.” Pietro comments, but Lance replies at near lightning speed. 

“No the fuck you can’t rubber ankle.” He snaps. “I got it.” 

He strides out of the room, his footsteps fading away on the stairs. Kurt hazards another try at moving and manages to kind of worm his way to sitting by shimmying his shoulders back and forth between Todd and Rogue. The other two mutants grumble a bit, but don’t push him away. He ends by flopping back on the old metal fender Todd repurposed into a headboard. The others continue on the game. Rogue tilts her cards at him in offering, but he shakes his head a bit. 

“You good?” He asks Todd, keeping his voice low under the others’ chatter. 

Todd slips a hand down to squeeze Kurt’s knee, turning his head to peek at him with one yellow eye. 

“Yeah fuzz, I’m good.” He says.


	15. Brooklyn Brooklyn, Let me In: Todd & an Old Flame

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Did I choose the corniest title possible for this chapter? Yes yes I did.
> 
> I feel like in other chapters I've hinted more at Kurt's past as I imagine it, but I wanted to play around with some of the elements of Todd's life before Bayville and the Brotherhood. 
> 
> Featuring running into a familiar face on a familiar basketball course, rooftop kissing, and the awkward but loving feeling of all your friends wingmanning you at once. 
> 
> How many times will I allude to Todd and Kurt canoodling various people before they actually canoodle with each other? That's for me not to know, and hopefully all of us to eventually find out.
> 
> Content warnings for jokes about death and me bullshitting basketball moves for a bit. Also nongraphic allusions to teens (~18ish, they're high school seniors) having sex.

“T, where the fuck have you been, dawg?” A voice Todd never expected to hear again calls behind Todd.

He whips around on the sidewalk and there gripping the chain link fence, is Manny, sweat plastering his black curls to his olive skin as he smiles at Todd through the fence. Todd can’t even get his name out before the other boy heaves himself up and over the basketball court fence to land in front of him. 

“Vickie made it out like you were dead, bro, shit.” Manny crushes him in a hug like it hasn’t been three years since he fled Brooklyn for Bayville. 

Manny still hugs the same, comes in with a slap on the back before he squeezes in tight, chest to chest. Todd squeezes him back, the years suddenly seeming like nothing. 

“Shit. It’s so good to see you, man.” Manny says as they pull back, he keeps his arm around Todd’s shoulder.

Todd ducks his head a bit, glancing down at the sidewalk, eyes tracking a bomb pop wrapper blowing on the wind. Manny jostles him a bit when he takes too long to look back. 

“Yeah?” he says, working to keep his voice low and casual. 

He steals a look at Manny. The other boy is watching him with those same big dark eyes that Todd remembers filling his dreams for months after sneaking into concerts and tagging buildings and subway cars together. His face has lost some of its chub, but he’s still soft on the edges. He still has that dimple in his cheek when he smiles at Todd’s look. Todd wonders if those lips still taste like Dr. Pepper chapstick.

“Fuck yeah, man.” Manny says. “You just, dropped out of the world. Out of my world.” 

Todd opens his mouth, but doesn’t have any words.

“Hey Manny, what the fuck are we playing or are you dicking around?” A voice calls, saving him from an explanation. There’s the slapping footsteps of sneakers on blacktop and then the rattling sound of hands hitting the fence.

“Holy shit, Tolansky??? They said Vicky fucking buried you.” Todd turns around and Tony, Marco, and Ricky have their faces pressed to the fence, all just as drenched as Manny, looking like Todd’s the fucking ghost of Christmas past.

“Man I told you he wasn’t dead! We saw this fucker on TV! He took out a semi.” Tony says, shoving Ricky with one no longer boney elbow. The once gangly brunette filled out, shooting up to be the tallest of them.

“He did not, it was a bus or some shit.” Ricky says, the shortest of them, rolling his eyes as he shoves his dreads out of his face.

“Dawg, your eyes, you look like a goat.” Marco says, smooshing his freckled face to the fence. 

“And you still look like a jackass.” Todd snaps back and the others all break out into laughter.

“Hey, hey, you wanna come in? You make five man. Hop the fence and join us.” Ricky says and Marco rattles the fence chanting “Come out and playyyyy” 

“Yeah, you too can make kissy eyes at each other fucking later.” Tony says, shit eating grin on his face. 

“Fuck off Tony.” Todd says before he can even think to stop himself, “You mad because no one will even look at your ass after they hear you open your mouth and show your head’s emptier than a strip club on Tuesday.” 

Down the block, Freddy calls Todd’s name. He and Manny both turn to where the Brotherhood and Kurt have stalled out a few feet ahead.

“You got places to be?” Manny asks. 

Todd shrugs. The whole reason they were in Brooklyn today was an errand for the Morlocks, but they’d finished up an hour ago and now were just kinda wandering around. Todd had been making naming places without explicitly taking them there, but he’d inadvertently led everyone to the park near his old neighborhood anyway.

“Maybe, maybe not.” Todd says. 

Manny jostles him with the arm still draped across his shoulder. “It would be cool if you played.” Then his face turns sly. And it’s the same smile he used to shoot Todd before they jumped a bathroom window to sneak into clubs, “Unless, you know, you can’t shoot anymore.” 

Todd shoves him, but not hard enough to dislodge the other boy’s arm, “Your dick can’t shoot, Rodriguez.” 

Manny pulls away and Todd’s stomach drops to his feet, thinking he’s fucked this up. But Manny wriggles his eyebrows at Todd, reaching out and running a thumb across his chin, just barely brushing the amphibious mutant’s lips. 

“Oh you wanna find out?” He says.

Then he’s jumping the fence, twisting to look back at Todd as he lands. “Come play with us Toddles!” 

Manny pauses a moment, arms raised, before his face turns to something a bit raw, disappointed. He shoots Todd a smile before turning back to the others, the game starting up again. 

Todd wanders up towards where the others are, but Kurt meets him halfway.

“What are you doing, that looks like an invitation if I ever heard one." Kurt says. "And it looked like you wanted to take it." 

"Yeah, but" Todd starts.

"But what?" Kurt cuts him off

"What's taking you two?” Lance calls. 

The two stop and turn back to where the Brotherhood is gathered on the corner.

"Todd's cock blocking himself." Kurt says.

"Such language, who taught you that?" Tabby asks, mock scandalized. 

"Freddy." Kurt says. 

Freddy never laughs and always works in little extra bits of information when he and Forge as the bigger mutant for explanations. The others turn to look at the tall boy with varying levels of confusion and scandalized, but he only shrugs. 

"More importantly, why are you cockblocking yourself Todd?” Pietro asks, dropping his tone to his therapist voice, one hand on his chin.

“It isn’t a cockblock! Man’s just handsy.” Todd says, “It was an invite to play ball.” 

Pietro mutters, too fast to hear in time to fight back, “Invite to play with his balls.” 

Over him, Kurt asks, expression knowing, “Did he always run a finger over your lips like that when he asked you to play ball?”

“He caressed your mouth and you’re over here talking to us?” Wanda asks, raising an eyebrow.

Todd shifts on his feet, eyes once again finding the gutter, “It’s been a long time.” 

"Oh for fuck’s sake" Pietro snaps and then Todd’s being whirled back towards the ball court. 

"Have fun, don't die, we meet back here at like 9." Pietro says, all the words blurring together as he pushes Todd against the fence. 

The others hoot and wave from ahead. Todd shoots them the finger before jumping, clearing the fence without even touching it. 

“Fuck yeah! Tolansky makes five!” Marco says as he lands.

Manny turns that soft smile on him, like the sun coming out after summer rains, “Glad you could make it.” 

Tony launches the ball at Todd’s chest and Todd catches it without flinching. He weaves around the other boys. Dribbling, before he ducks around Ricky and jumps, sinking a free throw from the half court. The others all hum various noises of impressed.

“You can still shoot.” Ricky says, sucking his teeth.

“Now fill us in on what you’ve done while you were dead, dawg.” Tony says. 

So Todd does, dropping in stories as they play, building up the cool parts, sanding off some of the roughest shit. The other chime in with commentary, calling bullshit, but not in any harsh way. They fill him in too, which old fossils are still kicking, who’s fucking who, who moved, what they’re doing after graduation. College, trades, working for fucking ever. The conversation flows with the game, picking up and slowing down, till suddenly the light is fading and Tony, Ricky, and Marco all find reasons to head out. They each run up and hug Todd on the way out. 

“Make sure to get this fuckers number so we don’t lose him again.” Tony says to Manny, squeezing Todd’s shoulder once more before he and the other guys trail out of the park in a cloud of shit talk and laughter. 

They’ve left the ball. Manny holds it in his hands, eyes roaming its faded orange, white, blue face. He glances up at Todd through long dark lashes.

“Walk with me?” he asks, something shy in the set of his broad shoulders. 

“Yeah, ‘course.” Todd answers.

“Did you really think I’d died?” Todd asks, voice soft as they amble their way down one of the less crowded side streets, they’re bouncing the ball back and forth between them, too slow to be a dribble. The soft whump of rubber on pavement makes a bubble around them, a barrier that somehow muffles the endless sounds of the city.

“Only for, like a minute.” Manny says, his voice soft, like it’s a confession, “But I went up your ma’s and she said you’d run out. So I went and saw Miss Gina and swear she almost shanked me because she thought I was with Vicky, but I convinced her I was good. She told me she’d gotten you a bus ticket and set you up with someone she’d met who could get you out of here.” 

“Gina never fucking tells anyone shit, how the hell did you work that magic?” Todd asks, pausing their back and forth with the ball. 

Manny ducks his head, shifting his face out towards the street crowded with cars. “I might have started crying.” 

“Man--” Todd says, tucking the ball under one arm as he turns Manny towards him with one hand. 

Manny’s eyes are wet, glistening under the street lights just kicking on when he looks up. “I missed you man.” 

Todd’s kissing him before he even thinks, pulling Manny in with a hand on his cheek. His lips are dry, and a little chapped. He tastes like yellow Gatorade. Just as quick as he’s done it, Todd panics pulling back. 

“Shit dawg, I’m sorry I didn’t even fucking ask.” He says, then sloppily grabs after the basketball as he drops it, ending up crouched over on the ground with his forearms wrapped around it. “Fuck, I don’t even know if you’re seeing anybody.” 

Manny’s laughing next to him, dropping down to squat beside him. He puts a fist to his mouth, steadying himself with his other hand on Todd’s shoulder.

“Todd, baby. Never fucking change, dawg.” He says, “How you face down fucking tanks but freak the fuck out over a kiss is beyond me.” 

Todd shoots him a glare. Manny is unphased, dragging Todd up with him as he stands.

“I didn’t ask you any of that shit either.” He says. 

Todd shrugs, “I’ve been around, and have a couple...alliances.” he says, drawing out the word with innuendo. “You?” 

“Remember RaeRae?” Manny asks. 

Todd hops a couple steps ahead, turning to walk backwards so he can stare at Manny like he just told him he has a talking lizard. Which okay, not the weirdest thing at this point in Todd’s life. 

“RaeRae Jones? The girl who always matched her fucking hair ties to her braces? The one who could fry any kid with two words and a look?” Todd asks.

Manny nods, ducking his head with a smile. 

“Who did you sell your soul to to get in her league?” Todd asks, “Wait, shit, I’m fucked. I really am dead now, I kissed RaeRae’s boyfriend.” 

Manny laughs, clapping Todd on the shoulder, “Nah man, it’s good, it’s good. We’re not exclusive. She has her girls and I get my boys.” 

Todd raises an eyebrow, smirking at Manny over the basketball. He chucks it at the other boy’s chest. Manny catches it without looking. 

“Oh your boys, Emmanuel?” Todd asks. 

“Yeah, I got a few I see now and then.” He says, “There’s this real cute one who hasn’t come round in a while though. Got these long legs and this big pretty mouth. Wicked eyes. His tongue’s fucking wild. Hoping we might get reacquainted real soon.” 

Todd doesn’t give him time to drop the ball out from between them before his lips are on Manny’s. 

“The rooftop still good?” He asks. 

“Still best kept secret in the borough.” Manny says. 

They’re only blocks away but it takes them a good twenty minutes as they stop against gated storefronts and brick walls. Taking turns pressing each other back, letting their hands and lips get reacquainted with the rest of them. Manny’s still all soft on the edges, but he’s broader and taller, the firmness of muscle underneath the soft swell of his belly and all through his thick biceps. He still has one of the best asses Todd’s ever held. The boy breathes out a startled “damn” against Todd’s lips when the amphibious mutant grabs him there and hoists him up against the faded brick of a bodega that looks like it’s frozen in 1965. An old woman hangs out the glass shop front door to yell at them and they scamper off, hand in hand laughing the whole way.

By the time they make it to the roof, Todd’s coming apart at the seams. Manny doesn’t seem much better. His hands never leave Todd’s body, skating under clothes and through his hair. They barely come up for air. They finally pull apart as they drop down to sit on the roof, breathing heavy as they stare at one another. 

This feels like a dream, something Todd only expected to have again on the edges of waking on slow mornings. Manny’s a mess of dried sweat, a fresh layer prickling on his brow, his lips are swollen and his shirt’s stretched out from Todd’s hands. He leans forward, placing a hand on Todd’s waist, at the edge of his faded t-shirt. 

“Babes, lemme see how you’ve changed?” he asks, voice a sweet whisper. 

Todd nods, swaying into Manny slipping his fingers up the hem of the other boy’s shirt. “You too?” 

He feels more than sees Manny nod against him as he pulls Todd in for a kiss. They get caught up in it again, moving fast and sweet, kissing deep like they’re breathing each other in. They eventually wrestle out of their shirts. As they slide back to the gravel of the roof, Todd feels suspended in time. He floats in the moment, in the feeling of Manny’s skin under his palms, the heat Manny’s nails leave as they run a line up his back. For minutes, or hours, the world is that rooftop, is Manny, is Todd.

Todd insists on walking Manny back to his building, to the same complex he’d spent over half his life in. His mother is likely still on the 9th floor, watching the news, iced vodka in hand. Manny doesn’t say anything, and that is a gift he give Todd. They kiss just outside the gate. Then Manny grabs Todd’s hand before they can part. 

“Where’s your fucking phone?” He says.

Todd grumbles, pulling it out, “How do you even know I have one?” 

“Because it’s been going off since 8:55.” Manny says, taking Todd’s phone and typing his number into Todd’s contacts before handing it back.

“Call me.” He says, an expectant look on his face.

“Like now?” Todd asks. 

“No, in three more years. Yeah right fucking now.” Manny says. 

Todd does, and Manny picks up on the third ring. 

“Manny Rodriguez, best kisser in Brooklyn, future national Poet Laureate. Who may I ask is calling?” He says. 

Todd chokes back a snort, “Todd Tolansky, skills rated NC-17, sower of chaos, mad scientist on the up and coming.”

Manny ends the call, shooting Todd a look. 

“There bitch, now you know how a phone call works. Call me sooner.” He says. 

“You know you have a career in teaching if you get tired of the whole national poet thing.” Todd says. 

Manny flips them off as they part. As Todd turns to go, Manny calls him back. 

“Hey T!” Manny says, waiting until Todd turns. “I’m glad my friend has friends looking out for him.” 

His face is warm in the dark. Todd smiles back at him, something whole settling into his chest. 

“Yeah, dawg, me too.” He says. 

He sees five missed calls from Pietro and calls Lance on the way back. 

“Where the fuck are you?” Lance says. 

“Alien abduction, but we took care of it. Check the news.” He says. “I’m like five minutes out, be right there.”

He makes it back to the park in 10 minutes. Everyone is clustered together under a streetlight, still holding the shopping bags of goods that was their share of the Morlock errand today. The twins are having one of their arguments that’s actually them expressing affection like a knife fight at each other, Kurt, Tabby and Freddy are bouncing a hacky sack back and forth at one another, doing a terrible job of keeping it in the air between them. Lance is on the phone, probably with Kitty, but he keeps scanning the street around him, looking for something. His eyes land on Todd and he waves an arm, the gesture more one of exasperation than greeting. 

“He just showed up, I gotta go, Love you babe.” Lance hangs up as soon as Todd’s close enough to enter the glow of the street lamp they’re under. 

“What the fuck time is it Toddikins?” Pietro asks. 

At the same time Tabby, heaves herself onto Pietro’s back, grappling onto him like a lemur to squint at Todd in the low light.

“Is that a hickey mister Tolansky?” She asks, a grin splitting her face.

“Is that five hickeys?” Wanda asks, voice purring with a laugh from where she peers down at Todd.

“Did you fucking eat at all?” Lance asks. 

“Oh I think he ate something.” Freddy says.

“FREDERIK!” Tabby crows in shocked delight as the other teens all break into low “oohhhhs.”

“There used to be a dollar pizza joint a couple blocks from here.” Todd says. 

“Works for me.” Kurt says, cutting through the heckling. 

Todd glances over at the blue boy. Kurt’s watching him with soft glowing eyes, something gentle in them, but something burning underneath. He quirks his lips in a lopsided smile when their eyes meet. 

Still chattering, the group all shift away from the fence to follow Todd in the direction of potential pizza. Todd sighs, the night familiar yet new around him, the buildings feel like a favorite jacket, long forgotten in the back of his closet but freshly exhumed. The last of summer is fading out of the humid air, a snap sneaking in on the wind hinting at fall. The blue mutant has fallen into step beside him, the chatter of the others a pleasant static behind them. As they turn the corner, Todd catches Kurt’s eye and smiles, and the blue teen returns it as if Todd could be the sun itself.


	16. To Dance in Sunlight: Kurt Wagner's School of Electric Boogaloo

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter took me several days to write my way through. I really love the idea of Kurt wingmanning all the X-boys by basically being like "Please stop acting like girls are another species and also work on yourselves, you doorknobs" and this ending up becoming a routine dance class. 
> 
> Expand that dance class out to the Morlocks and Brotherhood after Lance spends a weekend at Xavier's and you get this chapter. I also wanted an excuse to have Todd and Kurt play off each other in another realm where they are equally matched, so here you go. 
> 
> Featuring: 
> 
> Todd and Kurt Dance-off   
> A Soul Train Line  
> Dance With *Feeling*  
> Crying Circles in the Sunshine
> 
> Warnings: 
> 
> Mentions of violence in the form of people attacking mutant teenagers  
> Depression and anxiety hints

“Todd, now, you with me?” Kurt asks at the front of the room.

Todd starts, feeling a prickle of self consciousness break out over his skin. Kurt and Lance had just wrapped up a demonstration of a tango for the room full of teenage mutant dudes, a mixture of Morlocks, X-Geeks and the Brotherhood. They were in a massive room in an old warehouse that the Morlocks used as their visiting base just outside of Bayville. After 15 minutes of the girls arguing about arbitrary gender divisions and Kurt agreeing, he’d finally gotten them to give them the room with a line of “They can’t even talk in front of you half the time, you want me to get them to dance? They’ll die of stroke.” The girls and other mutants not interested in the dance lesson ceded the room, laughing at that. 

The room cleared, Kurt had volunteered Lance to be his first demo partner, since he’s the one who suggested these combined classes. During Lance’s week long vacay from the Brotherhood at the Xavier’s Mutant Militia Mansion, Lance had joined in on what the X-Geeks called “Herr Wagner’s School of Electric Boogaloo” a name which the blue mutant took to with an utterly straight face. 

Which were essentially dance classes the boys all took part in because one day Kurt snapped and went from “I don’t know how to tell you girls are fucking people and you can just talk to them to see if they want to suck face” to “No pick up artistry is not a thing, learn some verdammt confidence instead of trying to insult someone into dating you.” At least, that’s the explanation the Brotherhood got by way of Lance, who got it by way of Kitty, who got it by way of Evan, because if you ask Kurt about it he just makes a disgusted noise like a dog tried to piss on his leg. Since Kurt had wormed his way into the Brotherhood’s domain and was cozy with the Morlocks, Lance suggested one day expanding the school of boogaloo to everyone. Given that Lance was the only Brotherhood boy with anything resembling a primary partnership, and Tabby thought this idea was hilarious and amazing, no one could really vote him down. Which brought them to here.

“You just did a demo with Lance, dawg.” Todd says, crossing his arms and rolling his eyes to the ceiling as if he’s being asked to take out the trash. 

Todd can dance. But he hasn’t in front of a crowd since a group of kids from the Brotherhood’s neighborhood cut the boombox and left when he’d tried to join in on their freestyle session. The memory of their sneers and how their eyes slid over him like he was nothing still cling to his skin. Kurt’s actually the only one who’s seen him move it in like a year, since they switched to dance offs instead of fist fights.

Kurt shakes head. “Dance is a language. Lance can memorize and recite right now, and he is very good at it--” Kurt adds as an aside, holding a reassuring hand out to Lance who waves him off, but Todd catches the smile he ducks his head to hide and Freedy ruffles the lanky boy’s hair, “But you can speak fluently. You conjure. I want them to see what it looks like. Now, will you, with me?”

Todd feels his face flush. Lance claps him on the back.

“Well how am I meant to refuse such a high invitation.” he drawls, stepping forward.

Kurt beams at him. 

“Music?” He asks 

Zappy the X-Geek with the lightning powers who has not chased Todd through a thunderstorm shooting lightning at him, hits play on the boombox Todd spliced into an iPod, which most certainly fell off a truck, again. 

The music fills the warehouse. Todd locks eyes with Kurt. As one they break into motion. Todd forgets about being nervous. Kurt flows where Todd breaks, all long, blending movements where Todd snaps and pops, each of his motions locking together like puzzle pieces building a whole. 

It isn't that Todd forgets their bodies are separate, but that the air between them becomes part of them, weaving with their movements, with the music. Even as they twist and spin away from one another, Kurt's eyes always find his as they come back around. They come together then spin apart, swinging off eachother’s momentum into flips and dives. Every place they touch sends tingles through Todd’s skin, radiating out like earthquake tremors. The song lasts maybe three minutes. It lasts an eternity. They end in a slide, hands locking together to pull each other in chest to chest, their leg’s kicked out in front of them. 

Kurt’s palm is hot in his. He’s panting a smile on his parted lips and Todd can see the tips of his fangs peeking out. Kurt’s watching him like Todd might be a miracle, like the sunset when it turns a lake to diamonds. Todd can feel Kurt’s heartbeat against his hand and hear his own in his ears. The room erupts in clapping and hoots. The moment shatters. Kurt stands, pulling Todd to his feet with him. He keeps their hands locked as he bows dramatically, raising his arms up and folding at the waist. Todd goes with him, feigning the air of a symphony conductor. 

“And that was dance as language.” Kurt says. 

“Great, now I’m too terrified to even try.” says Brute, a massive mo-hawked green kid, who Todd can only tell apart from his brother Hump by the fact that Brute dresses like a baby Hell’s Angel and Hump dresses like he’s planning to herd cattle at any minute.

Kurt holds up a finger to Brute, asking him to wait a second. 

“Lance, when did you first start dancing?” Kurt asks, turning to the taller mutant. 

Lance weaves his head back and forth, sussing out the math. “Like, not even a year ago?” 

Kurt nods, and murmurs start up around the room. 

“Und Todd, when did you start dancing?” Kurt asks.

Todd smirks, “I dunno dawg, when did I start walking?”

“On four legs or two?” Pietro mutters, just low enough for Todd to hear next to him. 

Todd shoves the gangly speedster, Pietro let’s the hit land and rocks with it.

“Und my answer is just the same as Todd’s.” Kurt says. “I did not ask Todd and Lance to join me to intimidate you into freeing up my next 90 minutes. I wanted to show you future possibilities. In less than a year, Lance can recite entire poems through his body without a word. After 18 years, Todd can spin epics from nothing. Dance is about building trust with your body and believing you can speak through it. We are just getting introduced today.” 

There’s nodding and shrugging around the room, though behind him Todd hears the frosty X-Geek mutter something in a snotty voice and Scott hiss at him to shut it. Kurt’s eyes seem to flicker in their direction before scanning the room again.

Kurt holds up a hand, counting off his fingers, “That in mind, some rules. One. No insults. You don’t make fun of each other, of me, of yourself. Do not cover your insecurities by trying to amplify someone else’s, or cut off judgment by making a mockery of yourself. Two. I am making suggestions, not rules--except for the one I just said. If a motion does not work in your body, do not try to make your body say what it refuses. We can work together to find a form that suits you. Three. Dance should be about pleasure. There should be a satisfaction in expressing yourself. If you find the focus of being perfect or right overtaking you, take a break. All good?” 

Taking the wave of hums and nods from the room as a sign to proceed, Kurt claps his hands. 

“Good. Now, I need you to dance badly.” Kurt says, smiling.

“I...I thought that we were here to not do that.” Freddy says. 

Kurt nods seriously. “Ja, but we need to start where we are. Is everyone here confident they can dance badly?” 

“Oh I’m fucking terrible.” Cell, a Morlock who’s purple skin is weirdly translucent, all his edges a little squishy under his tank top and basketball shorts calls from the back of the room.

“Perfect!” Kurt says, “Keep that confidence the entire time, compete to be the worst dancer in the room. Sell it to me! Now, are any of you familiar with Soul Train?” 

Several of the mutants nod, but over half the room looks on in confusion. 

“Dawg, how the fuck does your Eurovision ass know about Soul Train?” Todd asks. 

Kurt smirks, “How does your American ass know about Eurovision? My parents were young circus performers in the 70’s with American friends.”

“Herr Wagner, we’re gonna need some context here.” Zappy says. 

“Right yes. Those who are familiar, help me out here.” Kurt says “We’ll line up in two lines across from each other, like playing red rover. The music starts, and the two at the front of the line will make their way down together, with the worst moves they can manage. Once they reach the end, the two after them go, und so on until everyone has made their way down the line. Understood?” 

Everyone nods, though a couple teens were clearly bullshitting getting it and have to be pulled into line. After a few minutes everyone is more or less lined up. Todd ends up at the front of one line. Kurt taps the guy at the front of the other line on the shoulder, an orange eyed Morlock named Boost on the shoulder, asking to take his place at the front. Boost looks like Kurt’s given him a stay on his execution and Kurt laughs. 

“I cannot ask any of you to do what I would not.” He says, then cues up the music. 

He locks eyes with Todd, and once again they move together. If dance is language like Kurt says, before they were setting fire to the mic, and now they’re moving like a possessed Speak’N’Spell. Todd jitters, exaggerating his movements offbeat and disconnected from one another, twisting his face into the intense serious expressions of dudes who think they’re the absolute shit after falling on their ass from trying a headspin. Kurt moves like a Worm on a string caught in a hailstorm, fast noodling motions going through all of his limbs. His face is set in what Todd could only call a Blue Steel model expression. Halfway down the line when they lock eyes, he winks at Todd, nodding his chin up like a come on and the amphibious mutant has to fight not to lose it.

Around them the other kids are laughing and hooting, and by the time the pair make it to the end of the line, Boost turns down the lane without hesitation. He and Hump make their way down the line together. They bounce up and down kicking their legs in what Todd can only guess is meant to be a Russian kick dance. At one point, Hump falls on his ass but rolls with it, dropping his shoulders to the floor and kicking his feet in the air, flashdance style. He flips onto his stomach, tossing his head so his floppy mohawk swings around his face as he bangs the floor with a fist. Boost leaps over Hump as he falls, sliding into a kneeling position as he lands, spinning to throw his hands back in Hump’s direction, tossing his head back. 

The line moves fast after that, everyone laughing, unafraid of what they might look like. Todd claps his way through each round, hollering with the rest of the mutants. Freddy and Pietro go down together, and Todd loses it when Freddy does his best frat bro impression, lifting the front of his shirt up and over his head so it bunches up around his shoulders. He faces Pietro as he body rolls down the aisle, fists pumping from his chest as the two stare each other down. Pietro appears to channel a stick bug, making broad, jerky movements that are all elbows and knees, popping up and down from a crouching crab walk. 

Two more pairs follow them, Cell and that multiplying kid, who splits himself in two and grabs his own copy’s ankles to roll down the aisle, while Cell just kinda, blobs his way down. Then its Brute and that X-Geek whose ass turns into a rocket launcher who do a weird mix of the swim and the worm. Then Scott and Lance square up together, pantomiming the most exaggerated cock fight Todd’s ever scene. Scott is all neck swivels and hip thrusts, while Lance does the white boy leg kick and shimmies his shoulders. Ice geek and Zappy go next. Zappy extends a hand to Frosty in an offer to duet, but Frosty snubs him, doing a turn before adopting an exaggerated strut. Pikachu brushes it off, making his way down in a winding jerky robot. Evan and a Morloch, who looks unremarkable except his eye is a fucking tiny sun, whose name Todd never caught, finish the line heading down the aisle cheek to cheek, arms stuck out in an an over the top Tango.

They reach the end and the room bursts into laughter and applause. Kurt cuts the music and turns to face the group. 

“Excellent!” He says. “You did wonderfully, and in doing so, you’ve failed.” 

All the X-Geeks and Lance share a knowing look, while Todd, Freddy, and Pietro share what the fuck looks with the Morlocks. 

“How can we fail and do wonderfully?” Hunk asks after a minute.

“Confidence is like 80 percent of anything you do. You all were confident you could dance terribly.” Kurt says, “and that confidence transformed your dancing to something good.”

“That's a wicked trick man.” Boost says, but he fights a smile. 

“If I had told you the secret though, you wouldn't have felt it. And then you wouldn't have danced truly.” Kurt says, shooting him finger guns. “This is your first lesson: move with confidence and everything runs smoother. Now, we spend the rest of the day expanding your vocabulary.” 

And that’s what they do. Kurt modeling moves and then having the room follow him, before long the time is up and Kurt’s working them through wind down stretches. That’s probably the newest bit for Todd. He’s never bothered with warmups or cool downs, but he has to admit his body feels looser afterwards. 

The next couple lessons go the same way, they warm up, Kurt teaches them some more moves, everyone gets to practice mixing the different motions together to whatever music is playing and they cool down while talking about what they liked best. Somewhere along the way Todd becomes unofficial co-teacher in the class. He refuses to lead anything, but Kurt still defers to him after introducing something new, asking the amphibious mutant’s contributions. He circles the room with Kurt during the practice period, adjusting postures and troubleshooting sequences with the other teens. 

Then on the third session, Kurt offers something new.

“We’ve been working on the motions, but they need a message behind them.” Kurt says, “What are you trying to say? Today when you’re building your dance, I want you to focus on an emotion we choose. I want you to pay attention to how that feeling shows up in you.”

“Anger!” Frosty the x-geek suggests and the others turn to him with varying looks of confusion. 

Todd tries not to roll his eyes. The ice dweeb seems to have it out for Kurt, finding some way to be obnoxious in the class, to push at the limits of the blue mutants first rule, but only by prodding and poking at the furball’s instruction and demonstrations.

“Bobby.” Zappy says, sounding only a fraction as annoyed as Todd feels like he should. 

"What, Kurt's gonna demo for us and he's like, mister sunshine and daisies. I didn't want to give him something easy." He says 

The Brotherhood and Morlock boys share pointed glances. Todd remembers the hard, low voice Kurt used in the hall that day with Mystique. He remembers flying through the window of that Amanda girl's house a fist in his ribs. Sunshine and daisies. Right. 

Kurt gives Bobby a long, flat look tongue pressed to the inside of his cheek. 

“You’re a bit ahead, but sure. That works, at least for the demonstration, and then we all can talk about what emotion the group would like to explore.” Kurt says, before strolling over to the boombox.

The blue mutant fiddles with the iPod Todd has spliced into the boombox for a moment, navigating the white brick with the eraser end of an old pencil. The other teens fidget, trading expectant glances as they wait. After a few minutes the blue mutant nods, murmuring to himself. 

"Right. Watch closely, but remember: this is not your anger but mine." He says, passing Scott the iPod. "Study not to copy, but to feel. See the shape of my anger and then we will try to find the shape of yours, ja? Scott, play please." 

Scott obliges, and everyone except Kurt jumps as a woman's trilling cry bursts from the boombox. The sound rises, filling the room, the voice breaking off in a husky rasp as a plucking guitar and staccato sounding drum come in underneath the singer. 

Kurt's moves in jerky measured motions, like a windup doll coming to life, a departure from his usual fluidity. He stretches his arms above his head, feet working back and forth in a series of precise sharp steps. His tail twists and arcs behind him, measured like a snake sizing up a mouse. 

A second singer, deeper voiced but just as anguished breaks in and the rhythm shifts, picking up speed. The few words the song has are in a language Todd doesn't understand, but from the crooning howls and rasping cries of the singers, they aren't happy. 

Kurt's movements pick up with the song, the jerkiness fading away but none of the sharpness. He expands, gestures sweeping out all around him. Long sweeps of his arms and legs are punctuated by loud cracks as he slaps his thighs and calves with his palms and tail. The raps against his body build on the song’s rhythm, feeding and deepening it. 

But the most striking thing about the dance is how alive Kurt's face is. This may be the most expressions Todd's ever seen on the blue mutant. A snarl, fangs bared as his tail strikes the floor one beat, eyes wide on the edge of tears, lips parted in a silent cry as he reaches out an arm the next. In the midst of his face contorting in anguish, in rage, he periodically breaks into a smile, head tossing back on the edge of laughter. 

The song ends and he flings his arms around himself. His tail wraps around his legs, ending at his ankle. One hand grasps his hip, the other cups his face as he tilts his head to the floor, lips parted, brow knit. He cradles himself as a lover might. The music stops. Kurt's heavy breathing is the only sound. It echoes into the darkness of the warehouse’s towering ceiling. Todd feels his own breath tight in his chest. Everyone has gone still. 

“Holy shit.” Boost says, and the spell on the room breaks, everyone breaking into applause and cursing.

Kurt smiles, bowing his head in a more sincere echo of the first class’ more exaggerated gesture.

“Anger is a messy place, mein friends. It is not one thing, but a shield. It protects what you cannot name.” he says, “When you dance with anger. You must not only show the shield, but hint at what lies beneath.”

“Anger is a hard place to go to, Bobby you did pick a challenge. If you cannot go to this place today, that is okay, we do something else.” Kurt says.

“I wanna do anger.” The multiple kid says, scuffing his foot on the floor. 

Freddy quietly echoes Jamie, and the room erupts. 

“Hell yeah, let's rage! With our feelings.” Brute says, and they all whoop.

Kurt shoots Todd an amused glance, and he shrugs, nodding.

“One more thing to consider as you find your dance's shape, what do you want your audience to feel, witnessing you? Do you want them to join you in anger? To comfort you? Or even to laugh?” Kurt says, “This is part of the story, too. If you want help, figuring out a motion, or accidentally slap yourself in the face and need ice, wave me over. But I will leave you to it otherwise.” 

Everyone quickly scatters to what has become their unofficial but still totally claimed practicing spots around the room. The initial pairings from the soul train line have become buddy teams that the group tends to drift into. Everyone still dances separately, but still defers to their partner for feedback or offers them encouragement as they go along. Todd thinks this may be the most words Lance and Scott have said to each other that don’t involve threats of bodily harm, though occasionally they still manage to bite out compliments or suggestions like they’re a your mama joke.

Kurt leans up against one of the support pillars in the room, drinking deeply from his water bottle as he watches the room. Todd posts up beside him, dropping into a squat. The furballs slides down to join him.

“You good?” Todd asks, keeping his voice low. 

Kurt snorts, “Bobby is a shit who thinks he’s too good to be here, and yet he comes every time.”

Todd rocks back on his heels, sweeping his eyes over the group for a moment, considering. Idly he notes he might need to check on Boost and Hump, they look two minutes away from a torn groin. 

“Want me fill his locker full of sugar free gummy bears?” Todd asks after a moment and Kurt startles out a laugh.

“Why sugar free ones? Are you worried for his health?” Kurt asks. 

“Nah, they give you mad farts, dawg.” Todd says, “Those shits stick everywhere, too. So if he eats him he’ll be ripping ass all through class, and if he doesn’t, his locker will still be pasted with tiny gelatinous bear corpses for weeks.” 

Kurt’s biting his knuckles to smother his laughter. “Berserker does not deserve to suffer that long night as Bobby’s roommate, but I appreciate the offer.”

He claps Todd on the shoulder before standing. He jerks his head to the group, eyes seeming to drift over the situation Todd’s noticed with Boost and Hump.

“Come, let’s make sure no one needs emergency care.” He says. 

Class carries on as normal again for the most part, though after a while, things jolt to a stop when a sob cuts out over the music. Todd looks over and sees Kurt with his hand on Brute’s shoulder. The big mutant is shaking with his head in his hands. 

“I just, I am so scared all the time, man.” He says, sniffling. “When I head out and feel the sun on my face, my first thought isn’t ‘oh, it’s so nice out’ it’s ‘what will someone do if they see me?’” 

Explosion ass--Cannonball, Kurt’s told him--tugs Brute gently to the ground, sitting next to him. Kurt goes with them, not breaking contact with the green mutant’s shoulder. Todd looks away from the little cluster and realizes everyone is looking to him for what to do. Shit. This is why he didn’t want to lead anything. He stifles a sigh and makes his way over to the trio. He crouches down on Brute’s other side. 

The others all drift after him. Hump coming up and plunking down behind his brother, throwing an arm around his waist as he leans on him. 

“Three weeks ago was the first time I danced in front of people in like a year.” Todd says, looking Brute in the eye. 

The bigger mutant snuffles, “But you’re like, so good man.”

Todd shrugs.

“People saw my face and didn’t give me the chance to dance. Didn’t like the look of me.” He says, “Every street I turn down, I watch people watching me. Dunno what bothers me more, when they look through me, when they flinch, or when they start throwing shit.” 

Kurt squeezes Brute’s shoulder, “There are towns in Germany I can never return to, because I am too afraid of what they might do if they can put hands on me again. My family has given so much to help me, when they could do as they please, go where they wish, otherwise. The image inducer bought me time in America, but when that lie fell, things started here too. People who smiled at me every day now run from me.” 

Kurt’s eyes stare at something far off, before he shakes himself. 

“Your fear makes sense. There are those who will strip the humanity from us with one glance. They will justify their monstrous vanity without even knowing us. Never would I deny you the right to your pain, the reality from which it comes. Not everyone on this earth is waiting for the right speech to help them hold our hands.” Kurt says, “But we can claim our place in the sun alongside each other. Alongside those who could go anywhere, do anything, but would not find it worthwhile if we are not beside them.” 

Brute’s crying has slowed down, but several of the teens in their little cluster are conspicuously looking away, or hiding their faces in their sleeves. 

“Those fuckers wouldn’t even look at me, nevermind dance with me. But you guys gave me a fucking standing ovation and trust me to tell you when you’re gonna break your ankle.” Todd says, “There are people back in Brooklyn I hadn’t seen for years who dropped their whole nights to find out how I was last I saw them. We’re all sitting here, with you now snot all down your face, acting like we’re not crying as you’re crying but we totally fucking are. Pretty sure anyone in this room would suckerpunch an assbag for you, dawg.” 

“Oh 100%, most I’ve ever agreed with frogger.” Evan says. 

“Defintely down to suckerpunch any douche who gives you shit, man.” Cannonball says. 

“I’d probably just trip them and we run, but same concept.” Cell says.

Murmurs of agreement rise up from their little feelings huddle. Boost gives them a watery smile and affectionately punches Todd’s shoulder hard enough that Freddy has to stealthily put a hand to his back to keep him upright.

“We’ll find the places we can bask in the sun again.” Hump says, “But I’m not going anywhere when you’re sad about it. When you’re scared. We can be scared together, we don’t just have to be angry to be cool.”

“Fuck yeah.” Boost says, and everyone shoots a glance at him. “What? We’re Morlocks, we’re together for feelings too.” 

Kurt smiles at him before turning back to Brute, “You are not alone in your anger. Nor what lies beneath it. And it is not yours to carry alone. Let us be with you, mein freund.” 

Brute gives another affection punch and Evan and Scott are the ones to catch Kurt.  
A quiet falls on the room and Kurt’s face turns thoughtful.

“Today is someday.” Kurt mutters to himself, and Todd shoots him a look. 

“You uh, wanna share with the group, dawg?” he asks, and everyone turns to Kurt. 

Kurt shakes his head, “Why are we talking about some days in the sun? Today is someday. Pietro, that tree, it’s like 15 minutes walking from here, ja?” 

Pietro scoffs, “For you, maybe.” 

Kurt gives him a bland look, and the speedster caves, agreeing. 

“Want me to check if the way is clear?” Pietro asks, but he’s gone in a blur before Kurt can answer. 

He’s back a minute later. 

“Sorry I took so long, I checked the surrounding area for like a two mile radius. Unless the deer are complete assholes, there’s no one to bug us.” Pietro says. 

“Deer can be real assholes.” Freddy comments. 

Kurt, bizarrely, nods in agreement to this before turning back to Brute. “Wanna take a field trip?” 

Brute ducks his head and smiles, “Yeah, that sounds great.” 

Hump and Cannonball thump his back and shake him from the shoulders. Everyone scrambles up to their feet. Pietro is first to the door, but Freddy follows right after, heaving up the massive loading dock gate. Then they’re tumbling out into the sunshine, the long unkept grass surrounding the abandoned warehouse brushing their calves as they go. Boost has grabbed the boombox hoisting it on his shoulders as it blasts at full volume. 

Cell and Jamie, the youngest start the dance, but soon they’re all doing it, moseying their way through the open field and into the woods beyond Kurt and Pietro leading the way. Evan and Sun eye flank the middle of the group, joining in the dance but still watching the horizon. Scott and Lance take the same position at the back. They reach the tree, an old, sprawling oak without shit raining on them. 

Once there they plop down in the thick clover and wild grass, sprawling in a tangle of teenagers between the tree’s massive roots. Someone shifts the music to something more chill, lowering the volume so they can still hear the wind in the leaves and the faint sound of bugs hopping on the pond’s surface. The afternoon sun is slanting warm and thick through the trees, bathing everything in a deep orange.

“Anyone else want to share in feelings hour?” Todd asks from his lounging position. 

There’s a pause. 

“I still really miss my aunt sometimes.” Freddy says, voice small. Todd reaches out a hand for the other boy’s shoulder, and his knuckles bump Lance’s on the way there.

“I miss sitting up late with Auntie O,” Evan says, whispering it like a secret. Todd hears rustling and the sounds of Kurt and Scott murmuring.

“I’m scared no one will like me enough to really love me, you know?” Hump says. Brute grabs his brother’s hand and squeezes, Suneye crawls over and bumps both their shoulders.

“I’m still sad about my parents. And that I lost like four years with my brother.” Scott says quietly. This time its Kurt and Evan’s voices that follow in a wordless hum.

They go round and round that way, everyone talking and moving around, offering fist bumps and arm squeezes, kicks of affection and hugs until they’re all kind of tangled together in a sprawling pile of limbs as winding as the tree’s roots. It’s only when the light starts to fade that they head back. 

This time, Brute and Hump lead the way, following steps behind Pietro, laughing and talking quietly. The others all trail after, less full on dancing, but more slow swaying, contentment draping over them like a blanket. Kurt lingers to the back and Todd pauses. Freddy shoots them a curious look but Todd waves him on. Lance walks backwards several steps, gesturing for them not to stray too far. He turns around only after Todd nods with a roll of his eyes. 

“You good?” He asks.

Kurt shoots him a smile, but it fades quickly. He blows out a raspberry, turning to look out over the overgrown puddle passing itself off as a pond. 

“Reconsidering my words.” Kurt says, voice quiet. 

Todd hops over to him, bumping his shoulder into the blue mutant’s “What’s there to consider? You said real shit, let him cry it out. Everyone cried, then you took us on a field trip. Pretty sure that’s teacher of the year shit there.” 

Kurt turns a tired smile on him, this time it lingers and Todd longs to run his fingers over the shape of it. 

“You did that too.” He says, “You got them all to talk about it.” 

Todd shrugs, but he ducks his head to hide a smile. A warm, lean arm lands around his shoulder. 

“Definitely teacher of the year shit.” Kurt says. 

Todd slings an arm around the blue mutant’s waist as they start to amble after the others. 

“Your ass, fuzz face.” He says. 

“Is amazing, yes, I know.” Kurt retorts. 

Todd snorts, but doesn’t argue.

“You went on a field trip?” Tabby says later that night when they’re gathered at the Brotherhood house, her voice holds betrayal. 

“And everyone cried about feelings?” Kitty adds. 

Kurt shoots a look at Evan, “What happened to ‘what happens at dance club stays at dance club.” 

Evan swirls a fry in a sinister amount of ketchup, unbothered, “You didn’t say that rule, Fuzzy man.” 

Kurt shoots the girls a look, “Don’t act like you aren’t all having a good time on your own too.” 

“You’ll never know.” Wanda says, giving them a blank look, but her eyes are laughing.

Rogue smirks, “We did swear to secrecy.”


End file.
